CHAPTER THREE
Earl Lord was a man of infinite patience. For a long time he had been dreaming of the big time, of real money. He knew that he had gone about as far as he could go on his own limited abilities and background. That wasn't far enough. Earl Lord wanted the big eight thousand dollar convertibles; the estate in Pound Ridge or some equally expensive status-type neighborhood; the winters in Miami or Nassau, the summers in Bar Harbor. He wanted the $500 a throw call girls; a box at the races, maybe even his own private plane with some flunky to fly it for him while he entertained some sky-happy broad in the cabin.
He wanted the kind of things that required a quarter of a million dollars a year. He had a hunch, basic intuition that this was in his reach if he could capitalize on his
