"What I'm gonna do," Vincent Moraco said, "is line you up with some high-class girls, dress nice, fit right in. They come in ten o'clock on, every night. Saturday guys're here with their wives or girlfriends, so maybe only one will come in, make the guys from out-of-town happy. The girls have a drink at the bar, they're seen and they leave.

But not with a guy. Any guy comes up to them, they're waiting for somebody, their husband. The guy keeps trying, becomes a problem"-Moraco half turned, his sleepy eyes moving to the soldier-"the Mutt here tells the guy in a nice way to get lost. The guy gets tough about it, the Mutt takes him outside."

"The Mutt," Randy said, "and you go by Vincent or is it Vinnie?"

"Stay with Vincent you'll be okay. The Mutt's also your bodyguard, so you pay him."

"How much?"

"Five a week, cash."

"I'm not sure I need a bodyguard."

"You not sure 'cause you never know, that's why you need one.

What you do, let your good customers with house accounts know the girls are here. Maybe three or four will come in, but not at the same time, so it don't look like a whorehouse."

Randy glanced over to see Carlo watching, Carlo nodding toward Number One, called a booth but actually a banquette, and Randy said, "Why don't we sit down and have a drink?" His first step in becoming a mob guy.

Moving to the booth, Vincent Moraco motioned to the Mutt to join them. The waitress, in her tux, was there before they were all seated.

"At Randy's," Randy said, "every waiter in the place is yours. Cindy here is my star. Cindy only takes care of this booth, Number One.

She needs help she's got it."

Cindy took their orders and left.

Watching her go the Mutt spoke his first words, saying with a country accent that turned Randy's head to look at him, "Man, she could sell pussy 'long with the others, you know it?"

Randy had to ask him, "Where you from?"

"Indiana," the Mutt said. "You know where Bedford's at? On U.S.

Randy made a decision. He said, "Mutt, I don't need a Hoosier hotshot fucking with my staff. You got it?"

The guy seemed surprised. Vincent Moraco said, "He knows his place."

And Randy's role was established. He was accepting the arrangement-since he didn't see that he had a choice-but would remain the boss here. It was Randy's second step approaching gangland.

"The way it works," Vincent said, stirring his Canadian Club and Coke, "your good customers from GM, Ford's, Compuware, call you over to the table. 'Say, Randy, you happen to know that redhead sitting at the bar?' You look over. 'Oh, you mean Ginger? You like to meet her? She staying at the hotel 'round the corner.' Then you say, 'We have a special arrangement, you want to party over there with Ginger, I can put it on your tab, here.' After that they know they don't have to carry extra cash with them, it's house-account pussy. The wife sees the bill, 'Jesus Christ, you buying drinks for the fuckin house?' What she don't accuse the guy of is getting laid."

"How much a trick?"

"Five."

"They're all the same?"

"Stand 'em on their heads… Yeah, all're five a trick."

"What about all night?"

"A grand, anything over an hour. The girls with baby-sitters get another two bills from the guy, over and above the tip."

"What if the customer, after he's down for one-"

"Wants to go again? The girl calls you and you put it on the guy's account."

"What's the girl get?"

"Three bills. There's a table of guys, out-of-towners here f'or a convention at Cobo, like the Society of Automotive Engineers, and they all want a piece of the action? The girl stays there at the hotel.

You get the relay team going it makes it easier."

"The girl does everything the guy wants?"

"As long as it don't leave marks. The guy wants her to piss on him, or take a dump on a glass-top coffee table while he's underneath looking up?" Moraco shrugged. "If she has to go, no problem. She don't, I don't know. Maybe the guy calls down for some prune juice."

Randy looked off at Cindy in her tux to get the picture out of his mind. He said to Vincent, "What's your take?"

"So you don't have to keep books, a flat eight thousand a week."

"Based on what?"

"An average night. Say four girls turning two tricks each, then times five nights, Monday to Friday, what's that?"

"Twenty thousand."

"They make twelve, we take eight. You pay every Saturday, keep anything over eight for yourself."

"What about slow nights?"

"It's up to you to bring in the business." "What if all the girls don't show up?"

"It can happen, say illness in the family."

"But you get your eight grand even if the girls don't make the nut."

Vincent said, "You have a problem with that?"

"I want to be sure I have it straight," Randy said, a sleepy look coming into his eyes as the image of Pierce Brosnan faded out and Lucky Luciano, without the pockmarks, faded in to take his place.

"What you're telling me," Randy said, "the girls could all quit and become stockbrokers, you still get your eight a week."

Vincent was nodding. "As your partners."

By the end of April, nine months into the arrangement, Randy's mob connection had cost him $116,200 out-of-pocket. He still saw himself as a wise guy, but no longer on the level of a Luciano. Christ, Luciano would've had Moraco whacked by now and taken over the girls.

Carlo was threatening to quit, not happy about some of the clientele, these goombas who'd show up, no reservation, and squeeze into Booth Number One without asking. The linen service, owned by Moraco's boss, cost twice what it should. And the Mutt, the Mutt was five bills a week down a rat hole. What did he do? The girls, the ones who showed up, didn't need protection.

Randy had never been curious about the Mutt until one Saturday, just before Vincent Moraco arrived for his free lunch and the eight grand, he had a talk with him, standing at the end of the bar.

"Tell me," Randy said, "what you do exactly."

It brought a frown. "My job? I keep an eye on you."

"For Vincent?"

"He don't talk to me either. I watch out for you 'cause I'm your bodyguard. But what you could say I do is no more'n luck the dog, 'cause you don't gimme any jobs to do."

Randy said, "Like what?"

"Like throwing the drunks out, the ones get loud and cause a commotion."

"Most of them are friends. What else?"

"What bodyguards do. Some guy's bothering you, I teach him a lesson."

"Well, I do have someone bothering me."

"Gimme his name, I'll tell him to leave you alone."

"Vincent Moraco."

That might've been too blunt, or too much all of a sudden for the Mutt to think about. He nodded, staring off, but after a moment said,

"Mr. Moraco, huh?"

"I want you to be at the meeting," Randy said. "Listen to what I tell Vincent, keeping in mind who pays you."

Signed celebrity photos-not the caricatures looked out from the walls of Randy's office, done in browns, recessed lighting and a lot of chrome. Vincent Moraco was seated across the desk from him, the Mutt over to one side, beneath a black-and-white photo of Soupy Sales.

"First of all," Randy said, "you realize that what my customers are paying to get laid appears on the books as profit, restaurant income."

Vincent said, "Yeah…?"

"It means I'm paying taxes on income that isn't income, over three hundred grand in luck money I can't write off."

Vincent said, "You look at it like you laundering the money."

"Yeah, but people who do that are paid a fee, they get something for the service, the risk they take."

"You need a bookkeeper know what he's doing."

"That's only half the problem."

"Yeah…?"