A young man named Bernard Chanticleer is oversheltered by his parents and is just beginning to discover girls at almost 20 years of age. At his father's library where he works, he meets a senstive young beauty named Amy who takes an interest in him. However, he becomes distracted by the glamorous go-go dancing presence of Barbara Darling, a sadomasochistic man-hating young actress whom he falls for after seeing her perform on several occasions. He sends her a letter, and is completely taken in by her luring response; he proceeds into her cherished trap of repeatedly drawing a man on for the kick of rejecting him. Eventually, though, he wises up to her tricks and, in a symbolic defiance of his parents, he steals his father's precious Gutenberg Bible from the library - deliberately in front of their faces - and runs with it through the streets of New York.