A gray gloom crawled in from the Gulf and hung over Retreat for days. Inside Ocean General, Zeke steadily improved, according to Dr. Kriss, who kept me updated on his condition. The surgeons had performed an exploratory laparotomy, she said, and were able to suture the distended loops of bowel. Of course none of this would’ve been possible without the solution he’d received in the ambulance.

I kept thinking about how he’d thrashed in the bed. But oddly, when I’d gone to review my tape of the incident, it was blank. I chided myself for not double-checking that the machine was recording, too caught up in the moment.

After that initial shock, Dr. Kriss reported, Zeke had grown calm. When she let me into the room, however, I found the bike thief bound to the bed with nylon straps. The nurse was changing the dressing on one of his wounds and he whimpered as her hands moved over him. Dr. Kriss hung back and listened to what passed for an interview.

“How are you feeling, Zeke?” I asked.

He hadn’t noticed me come in, and flinched as if I had a needle in my hand.

“I’m a journalist,” I said. “Can I ask you some questions?”

“Let me out?”

“I’m sorry, I can’t do that.”

He noticed Dr. Kriss, then motioned with his chin for me to lean in.

“You’re a journalist?” he whispered.

“Yeah.”

“What’ll they do with me?”

“Just keep you here a little bit longer, run some tests, make sure everything’s okay.”

“And then what?”

“And then you’ll go home.”

“No,” he said, loud enough that I had to back away. “I mean, and then what? What will they make me do?”

“I don’t understand.”

“I know all about it,” Zeke said. “MK-Ultra, the whole setup. You put that stuff in me, so now what? What will I do?”

In the room next door, a woman started moaning.

“Like her,” Zeke muttered. “She’s lost her fucking mind.”

I’d check later, and it was the mother of a patient unrelated to the trial.

“Lord,” he said, and strained against the straps, letting out a gasp of pain. “I’m still me right now. I know I’m still me, today.”

I looked to Dr. Kriss. She just stared right back, as if reminding me that this was what I’d asked to see.

There was a little CD player by the limp potted plant on the windowsill. In a stack of CDs—belonging to staff, I assumed, or maybe left behind by a previous patient—I found a copy of 1, the compilation of Beatles hits.

“How about some music?” I said.

I dropped the CD in the tray and looked at the track list, trying to find something off his favorite, Rubber Soul.

I said, “ ‘Ticket to Ride’?”