{"id":"01KG6FVH1HD1YM7AYZ3TXPJDRF","cid":"bafkreiag7gaxwtuxhcr5mcbxfkhdoaufxxjjckrp23tsk6rjjt3kj52jtu","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":1899,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:20.744Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 5","source_file":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","start_line":1849,"text":"was like dragging the Statue of Liberty around the floor. The only way I could even half\nenjoy myself dragging her around was if I amused myself a little. So I told her I just saw\nGary Cooper, the movie star, on the other side of the floor.\n\"Where?\" she asked me--excited as hell. \"Where?\"\n\"Aw, you just missed him. He just went out. Why didn't you look when I told\nyou?\"\nShe practically stopped dancing, and started looking over everybody's heads to\nsee if she could see him. \"Oh, shoot!\" she said. I'd just about broken her heart-- I really\nhad. I was sorry as hell I'd kidded her. Some people you shouldn't kid, even if they\ndeserve it.\nHere's what was very funny, though. When we got back to the table, old Marty\ntold the other two that Gary Cooper had just gone out. Boy, old Laverne and Bernice\nnearly committed suicide when they heard that. They got all excited and asked Marty if\nshe'd seen him and all. Old Mart said she'd only caught a glimpse of him. That killed me.\nThe bar was closing up for the night, so I bought them all two drinks apiece quick\nbefore it closed, and I ordered two more Cokes for myself. The goddam table was lousy\nwith glasses. The one ugly one, Laverne, kept kidding me because I was only drinking\nCokes. She had a sterling sense of humor. She and old Marty were drinking Tom\nCollinses--in the middle of December, for God's sake. They didn't know any better. The\n\n<!-- [Page 41](arke:01KG6FHT8BQRSRT4FJTMJZ5E3F) -->\nblonde one, old Bernice, was drinking bourbon and water. She was really putting it away,\ntoo. The whole three of them kept looking for movie stars the whole time. They hardly\ntalked--even to each other. Old Marty talked more than the other two. She kept saying\nthese very corny, boring things, like calling the can the \"little girls' room,\" and she\nthought Buddy Singer's poor old beat-up clarinet player was really terrific when he stood\nup and took a couple of ice-cold hot licks. She called his clarinet a \"licorice stick.\" Was\nshe corny. The other ugly one, Laverne, thought she was a very witty type. She kept\nasking me to call up my father and ask him what he was doing tonight. She kept asking\nme if my father had a date or not. Four times she asked me that--she was certainly witty.\nOld Bernice, the blonde one, didn't say hardly anything at all. Every time I'd ask her\nsomething, she said \"What?\" That can get on your nerves after a while.\nAll of a sudden, when they finished their drink, all three of them stood up on me\nand said they had to get to bed. They said they were going to get up early to see the first\nshow at Radio City Music Hall. I tried to get them to stick around for a while, but they\nwouldn't. So we said good-by and all. I told them I'd look them up in Seattle sometime, if\nI ever got there, but I doubt if I ever will. Look them up, I mean.\nWith cigarettes and all, the check came to about thirteen bucks. I think they\nshould've at least offered to pay for the drinks they had before I joined them--I\nwouldn't've let them, naturally, but they should've at least offered. I didn't care much,\nthough. They were so ignorant, and they had those sad, fancy hats on and all. And that\nbusiness about getting up early to see the first show at Radio City Music Hall depressed\nme. If somebody, some girl in an awful-looking hat, for instance, comes all the way to\nNew York--from Seattle, Washington, for God's sake--and ends up getting up early in the\nmorning to see the goddam first show at Radio City Music Hall, it makes me so\ndepressed I can't stand it. I'd've bought the whole three of them a hundred drinks if only\nthey hadn't told me that.\nI left the Lavender Room pretty soon after they did. They were closing it up\nanyway, and the band had quit a long time ago. In the first place, it was one of those\nplaces that are very terrible to be in unless you have somebody good to dance with, or\nunless the waiter lets you buy real drinks instead of just Cokes. There isn't any night club","title":"Chunk 5"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6FV13CF8EYK8ZH4S5HFGWW","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KFF1K6A8V452X8SQKY55DD16","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6FVH1JG9KXY1F220GZP937","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6FVH1JK6H7R4WM9ATS2WSA","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:23.377Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:41:29.290Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}