Without his thyroid pills, most of Ferguson’s vital organs would start to slow down. His body would have trouble maintaining its proper temperature; he’d feel cold even in a room of seventy degrees. His muscles would ache, a by-product of their difficulty removing built-up waste material. His energy would ebb, a pale of lethargy descending over him. Within two or three days he would begin to slide toward clinical depression and acute anxiety, his brain having trouble keeping its serotonin levels stable.
At some point Ferguson’s tissues would begin to swell, and he would develop fluid around his heart and lungs. Along the way his brain would turn to mush, and he’d become psychotic, assuming he was still alive.
But skipping the first dose of T4 pills he took every evening had a paradoxical effect: It made him hyperactive. His heart rate bounded upward, and his mind raced as if maybe he’d drunk one too many pots of coffee.
Unable to sleep, Ferguson spent the night pacing the small cell, one of a dozen in the dank basement block. He was the only one here. Every so often, he stopped moving, straining to hear sounds from outside or above him, but all he heard was silence.
He strode back and forth in the small cell: three and a half strides this way, three and a half that, four to the front, four to the back. He did it for hours, trying to puzzle out the situation and decide what to do.
Rather than getting tired, his energy seemed to grow with each step. So when his interrogator came for him around four a.m., Ferguson was not only wide awake but also fully alert, the opposite of what the North Korean expected.
The man stood outside the bars and introduced himself in Korean, asking if Ferguson spoke the language. Ferguson told him in Russian that he did not.
Chinese?
No.
“I can speak German or English if you want,” said Ferguson, switching between the two languages. “My French might work.”
“We can speak English,” said the man. “What is your name?”
“Ivan Manski.”
“What do you do?”
“I sell scientific instruments for the Redstreak Company of Moscow.”
“That is what you do?”
“Yes.”
“You should not lie to me,” said the man gently. He had a round, sad face with owl eyes that blinked, as if he were missing his glasses. He wore a long gray tunic and pants, civilian clothes.
“I’m not lying,” Ferguson said.
“I have been told that you are an arms dealer.”
“Arms? I don’t understand.”
Owl Eyes blinked. “You sell weapons to outlaws.”
“Never.”
The North Korean reached into his pocket and took out Ferguson’s bottle of pills. “This medicine is important to you?”
“Sure.”
“If you are truthful, you can have it.”
Ferguson shrugged.
Owl Eyes pocketed the pills and walked away.