A man repeatedly threatens to beat up Bartleby and even light him on fire, but his boss tells him not to.
A headless hawk is found in an air duct.
Bartleby becomes progressively ill physically as the film continues, at first just looking pale but then later seen under an overpass, shivering and refusing to eat anything or come inside even though it's cold out. Bartleby is later found lying on the ground under the overpass, and when his boss worriedly checks his pulse, he finds out that Bartleby has died. Despite him having found Bartleby extremely annoying, he feels profoundly sad over the loss of him and realizes that he considered Bartleby subconsciously to be a friend. He realizes that the letter of recommendation he wrote after firing him was perceived by Bartleby to be a dead letter. He tries to write a memoir and send it off to a publisher, only for his manuscript to be rejected. At this, he loses his mind and becomes Bartleby himself, refusing to leave the publishing agent's building because "I'd prefer not to".
The office employees all dislike Bartleby immensely and make fun of him, believing him to be mentally deficient.
Bartleby is seen in his boss' surreal dream pretending to fire a gun while saying something in German.
