- [last lines]
- Ira: Mrs. Schmidt asked me to move out. That place next door to you, is that still empty?
- Margo Sperling: I don't know, Ira. I don't think I could take it. I mean you just never say anything, for God's sake. It's not fair, 'cause I have to keep up my side of the conversation and your side of the conversation. Yeah, that's it - you just never say anything, for God's sake. I want some feedback from you. I wanna... I wanna know what you think about things... and what you think about me.
- Ira: Jesus Christ, would it kill you if once in a while you wore a goddamn dress?
- Margo Sperling: You know what I had to go through to hassle up this dough? I laid off four ounces of pure red Colombian for $15 an ounce. I mean, it's disgusting. Some freak over on Pico thinks I'm Santa Claus, I swear to God. $15 an ounce... $15 an ounce. This grass was so great, I can't tell you. There was so much resin in it, it made your lips stick together.
- Margo Sperling: I'm gonna' go down to the police station and get a private detective's license. If we teamed up, we'd be great together.
- Ira: That's just what this town has been waiting for. A broken-down old private eye with a bum leg and a hearing aid, and a fruitcake like you.
- [Ira's talking to Margo]
- Ira: Back in the Forties, this town was crawlin' with dollies like you. Good-lookin' coquettes tryin' their damnedest to act tough as hell. I got news for you: they did it better back then. This town doesn't change - they just push the names around. Same dames... screwin' up their lives just the same way.
- Ira: Why was, uh, this Escobar blackmailing you?
- Laura Birdwell: Well, I was seeing this man. We were having an affair.
- Ira: Your husband didn't know anything about it?
- Margo Sperling: Does the Pope shit in the woods?
- Ira: Listen, doll, let's get one thing straight. I'm a loner. I always have been a loner. I was a loner when I was a kid. I was a loner when I was married. Probably why we broke up. I'm by myself now because I like it that way. Nothing personal, but I don't like to talk about it. There's too damn much talk in the world as it is.
- Laura Birdwell: I am going to be totally open and honest with you. I'm going to lay myself naked before you. I hope you can appreciate that.
- Margo Sperling: He'll try.
- Ira: One more thing, doll, about my fee... My fee. I get paid $25 a day, plus expenses.
- Margo Sperling: What's he talking about?
- Ira: Listen, sweetheart, you're talking to Ira Wells, not some low-rent gumshoe. I'm the best, and I get paid like the best.
- Margo Sperling: [Ira has doubled over and collapsed from severe stomach pain] Ira, wait a second. We'll get you to the hospital.
- Ira: I'm not going to any goddamn hospital.
- Margo Sperling: You gotta' go to the hospital, so they can find out what's wrong with you.
- Ira: I know what's wrong with me. I got a perforated ulcer. It's starting to bleed again. They get me in the hospital, they'll want to operate.
- Margo Sperling: Let them. That's better than walking around like this.
- Ira: I will not go through another goddamn operation.
- Margo Sperling: Lay back down. There's nothing to be afraid of.
- Ira: It's my gut. It's my life. I won't let anybody call me a goddamn coward. I went through two operations last year on my gut. Two operations! Do you realize what it's like in a veterans' hospital... lying on your back for six months, with tubes and shit going every which way?
- Ira: [continues] Maybe I don't have much of a life right now, but it's better than that. But I'll be goddamned if I let those butchers open me up again. Never! I'll blow my brains out first...
- Margo Sperling: Stop it. Just stop it.
- Margo Sperling: Boy, it's really lucky for you that I just happen to be a very self-destructive person.
- [Margo has pictures of her cat, Winston, that she wants Ira to find]
- Margo Sperling: This little kitty is just a little honey bun. Give this little cat a break!
- Ira: Listen, doll, let's get something straight. As long as we're gonna' be working together, try to act like a lady, will you?
- Ira: What about this guy that took your cat?
- Margo Sperling: Brian Hemphill. He's this guy... he's really sort of a tuna. He just hangs around, you know. And, we used to have this thing going - kind of a... sexual interlude. Never really came to anything.
- Margo Sperling: [continues] Now, Brian and this friend of his, sometimes they give me money to schlep things up to this guy in Bakersfield.
- Ira: "Things"? What things?
- Margo Sperling: You know, "things." Material things. I mean, worldly possessions. Washing machines, TV sets, clock radios... "things."
- Ira: These things you're telling me about, did it ever cross your mind they might be hot?
- Margo Sperling: [scoffs] Ha, who's to know? I mean, I'm not by nature a curious person.
- Ira: I'll bet.
- Margo Sperling: I mean, go with the flow.
- Ira: That's what I always say.
- Ira: Harry Regan was a pal of mine close to 24 years. Whoever it was that killed him is gonna' be goddamn sorry.
- Margo Sperling: Mr. Wells, I can understand your feeling that way. I mean, as an actress, I understand it as a motivation.
- Ira: [after Margo has just seen a dead body] I'm sorry, doll. What I never told you is this is the hardest goddamn way in the world to make a buck.
- Hippie Gardener: You with the police?
- Ira: That's right.
- Hippie Gardener: You look kinda old to be a cop.
- Ira: Oh, don't worry. This is just a disguise.
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