"Why should I?
I know how you feel.
You hurt."
"I hurt like hell, Doc," Standhurst said.
"Colton said those stones you took out of me were big as baseballs."
"They were pretty big, all right."
"He also said I’d be wearing this bag you hooked into me until the kidney healed and took over again."
"You'll be wearing it quite a while."
The old man stared at him.
"You know, you're both full of shit," he said calmly. "I’ll wear this in my grave. And that isn't too far off, either."
"I wouldn't say that."
"I know you wouldn't," Standhurst said.
"That's why I'm saying it.
Look, Doc, I'm eighty-one years old. And at eighty-one, if a man lives that long, he gets to be a good smeller of death – for anyone, including himself.
You learn to see it in the face or eyes.
So don't bullshit me.
How long have I got?"
The doctor looked into the old man's eyes and saw that he wasn't afraid. If anything, there was a look of lively curiosity reflected there.
He made up his mind quickly.
Colton was all wrong in the way he was handling it.
This was a man. He deserved the truth.
"Three months, if you're lucky, Mr. Standhurst. Six, if you're not."
The old man didn't blink an eyelash.
"Cancer?"
The surgeon nodded.
"Malignant and metastatic," he answered.
"I removed one complete kidney and almost half of the other.
That's why you have that waste bag."
"Will it be painful?"
"Very. But we can control it with morphine."
"To hell with that," the old man said. "Dying is about the only thing in life I haven't experienced.
It's something I don't want to miss."
The teletype began to clatter suddenly and the old man glanced over at it, then back at the doctor.
"How will I know when it's close, Doc?"
"Watch the urine in that bag," the doctor said.
"The redder it gets, the nearer it is.
That means the kidney is passing clear blood instead of urine, because the cancer will have choked off the kidney completely."
The look in the old man's eyes was bright and intelligent.
"That means I’ll probably die of uremic poisoning."
"Possibly. If nothing else goes wrong."
Standhurst laughed. "Hell, Doc," he said, "I could have done that twenty years ago if I'd just kept on drinking."
The surgeon laughed.
"But look at all the fun you'd have missed."
The old man smiled up at him.
"You Socialists will probably declare a national holiday." "I don't know, Mr. Standhurst." The doctor returned his smile.
"Who would we have to complain about then?"
"I'm not worried," the old man said. "Hearst and Patterson will still be around."
The doctor held out his hand. "Well, I've got to be going, Mr. Standhurst."
Standhurst took his hand.
"Good-by, Doc.