Wetlands Maul?

She got irritated after two attorneys from Washington, D.C., called. They represented the Citizens to Save the Katy Prairie, an anonymous group "that didn't want to be in the forefront," she says. Godfrey, a big-time Democratic contributor slated to be the next ambassador to Brazil, signed up as local counsel.

For Corps of Engineers officials, it was just the latest plot twist to shake their heads over. Earlier this year, they received a secretly commissioned archaeological survey outlining potentially significant historical sites on the property. The corps investigated, turning up no sign of anything worth preserving.

Rice farming and other uses of the land have essentially wiped out any traces of 19th-century settlements that may have been in the area, says corps archaeologist Bryan Guevin.

He and others at the corps are still scratching their heads over who commissioned the first study and organized opposition to the mall. Guevin earlier told the Wall Street Journal that the secret study, completed by Janet Wagner, was "very James Bondish."

"There's been a lot of weird stuff like that," says John Machol, the corps official who was in charge of issuing the permits, which went out late last month. In addition to that study, fliers from a group described as "The Friends of Katy Prairie" were distributed to homes in the area, outlining objections to the mall. Machol had never heard of the group and never identified anyone associated with it by name.

Mike O'Brien, president of the Houston Homeowners Association, ventured into this shadowy terrain earlier this year when someone introduced himself as a local resident and asked him to join the opposition. It turns out, O'Brien says, he later discovered his visitor was secretly working for a group opposed to the mall.

"I asked him point blank who he represented, and he refused to tell me," says O'Brien.

No one seems to be able to identify who has been behind the scenes pulling strings. A spokesman for the Mills Corporation vehemently denies organizing any kind of opposition to the rival mall.

Meanwhile, Mills recently sent out a press statement saying it was well under way with that building project and that the corps had issued Mills its wetlands permit on August 6. The Mills mall should be open to shoppers by fall of next year.

For the developers of the Houston Premium Outlets mall, it was just more bad news in a strange series of setbacks.