Red Bates blew his brains out the other day. He'd been on a drunk for the previous three

months. I saw him, not long before he shot himself. He came to the door in his piss- stained

boxer shorts; that he'd been wearing them for days was evident to a quick glance. He knew he

was foul.

Although he let me in, at one point, he half turned away for some long moments. I could sense

his shame, and his anger. He looked like something made out of sticks, clothed in flesh,

supporting himself against his office chair. I don't remember what business we discussed, but

he told me he couldn't take it anymore. He said, "I'm seventy- six years old and I can't take it

anymore."

It makes me think of this, from a poem by Ernest Dowson:

"Ghosts go along with us until the end;

This was a mistress, this, perhaps, a friend.

With pale, indifferent eyes, we sit and wait

For the dropt curtain and the closing gate:

This is the end of all the songs man sings."