BERNIE: Nineteen, twenty.
DANNY: You're talking about a girl.
BERNIE: Damn right.
DANNY: You're telling me about some underage stuff.
BERNIE: She don't gotta be but eighteen.
DANNY: Was she?
BERNIE: Shit yes.
DANNY: Then okay.
BERNIE: She made eighteen easy.
DANNY: Well, then.
BERNIE: Had to punch in at twenty, twenty-five easy.
DANNY: Then you got no problem.
BERNIE: I know I got no problem.
DANNY: So tell me.
BERNIE: So okay, so where am I?
DANNY : When?
BERNIE: Last night, two-thirty.
DANNY: So two-thirty, you're probably over at Yak-Zies.
BERNIE: Left Yak-Zies at one.
DANNY: So you're probably over at Grunts.
BERNIE: They only got a two o'clock license.
DANNY: So you're probably over at the Commonwealth.
BERNIE: So okay, so I'm over at the Commonwealth, in the pancake house off the lobby, and I'm working on a stack of those raisin and nut jobs . . .
DANNY: They're good.
BERNIE: . . . and I'm reading the paper, and I'm reading, and I'm casing the pancake house, and the usual shot, am I right?
DANNY: Right.
BERNIE: So who walks in over to the cash register but this chick.
DANNY: Right.
BERNIE: Nineteen-, twenty-year-old chick . . .
DANNY: Who we're talking about.
BERNIE: . . . and she wants a pack of Viceroys.
DANNY: I can believe that.
BERNIE: Gets the smokes, and she does this number about how she forgot her purse up in her room.
DANNY: Up in her room?
BERNIE: Yeah.
DANNY: Was she a pro?
BERNIE: At that age?
DANNY: Yeah.
BERNIE: Well, at this point we don't know. So anyway, I go over and ask her can I front her for the smokes, and she says she couldn't, and then she says Well, all right, and would I like to join her in a cup of coffee.
DANNY: She asked you . . .
BERNIE: . . . yeah.
DANNY: For a cup of coffee?
BERNIE: Right?
DANNY: And all this time she was nineteen?
BERNIE: Nineteen, twenty. So down we sit and get to talking. This, that, blah, blah, blah, and “Come up to my room and I'll pay you back for the cigarettes.”
DANNY: No.
BERNIE: Yeah.
DANNY: You're shitting me.
BERNIE: I'm telling you.
DANNY: And was she a pro?
BERNIE: So at this point, we don't know. Pro, semi-pro, Betty Coed from College, regular young broad, it's anybody's ballgame. So, anyway, up we go. Fifth floor on the alley and it's “Sit down, you wanna drink?” “What you got?”, “Bourbon,” “Fine.” And goddam if she doesn't lay half a rock on me for the cigarettes.
DANNY: No.
BERNIE: Yeah.
DANNY: So this changes the complexity of things.
BERNIE: For a bit, yes. But then what shot does she up and pull?
DANNY: You remind her of her ex.
BERNIE: No.
DANNY: She's never done anything like this before in her life?
BERNIE: No.
DANNY: She just got into town, and do you know where a girl like her could make a little money?
BERNIE: No.
DANNY: So I'm not going to lie to you, what shot does she pull?
BERNIE: The shot she is pulling is the following two things: (a) she says “I think I want to take a shower.”
DANNY: No.
BERNIE: Yes. And (b) she says “And then let's fuck.”
DANNY: Yeah?
BERNIE: What did I just tell you?
DANNY: She said that?
BERNIE: I hope to tell you.
DANNY: Nineteen years old?
BERNIE: Nineteen, twenty.
DANNY: And was she a pro?
BERNIE: So at this point I don't know. But I do say I'll join her in the shower, if she has no objections.
DANNY: Of course.
BERNIE: So into the old shower. And does this broad have a body?
DANNY: Yeah?
BERNIE: Are you kidding me?
DANNY: So tell me.
BERNIE: The tits . . .
DANNY: Yeah?
BERNIE: The legs . . .
DANNY: The ass?
BERNIE: Are you fucking fooling me? The ass on this broad . . .
DANNY: Young ass, huh?
BERNIE: Well yeah, young broad, young ass.
DANNY: Right.
BERNIE: And lathering her . . .
DANNY: Mmmm.
BERNIE: And drop the soap . . . This, that, and we get out. Toweling off, each of us in his or her full glory. So while we're toweling off, I flick the towel at her, very playfully, and by accident it catches her a good one on the ass, and thwack, a big red mark.
DANNY: No.
BERNIE: So I'm all sorry and so forth. But what does this broad do but let out a squeal of pleasure and relief that would fucking kill a horse.
DANNY: Huh?
BERNIE: So what the hell, I'm liberal.
DANNY: If that's her act, that's her act.
BERNIE: Goes without saying. So I look around, figuring to follow in my footsteps, and what is handy but this little G.E. clock radio. So I pick the mother up and heave it at her. Catches her across the shoulder blades, and we've got this long welt.
DANNY: Draw blood?
BERNIE: At this point, no. So what does she do? She says “wait a minute,” and she crawls under the bed. From under the bed she pulls this suitcase, and from out of the suitcase comes this World War II Flak Suit.
DANNY: They're hard to find.
BERNIE: Zip, zip, zip, and she gets into the Flak Suit and we get down on the bed.
DANNY: What are you doing?
BERNIE: Fucking.
DANNY: She's in the Flak Suit?
BERNIE: Right.
DANNY: How do you get in?
BERNIE: How do you think I get in? She leaves the zipper open.
DANNY: