Lucas "Lucky" Aricello sat in a hard wooden chairbehind a simple desk. He had a laptop, acell phone, and a cup of coffee laid out on one side, and the unfolded paperwas spread out on the other. Phones upand down the hall were ringing off the hook. It was Friday, and there were three day of horse races. The ponies always attracted good money overthe weekends.
There was a soft tap at his open office door, and Luckylooked up from the stock pages. One ofhis operators was standing in the doorway patiently.
"Whatcha got?" Lucky asked as the young man stepped inside and handed over a call slip.
"This guy called in, wants to put twenty large on arace," The operator said.
"Okay, what's the problem?" Lucky asked, confused. "Take the peckerwood's money and move onto the next call."
"Normally, I would, sir," The young man said, buthe pointed to the name on the call sheet. "This guys is already into us for sixty large, I doublechecked. I wasn't sure if you'd want tokeep that kind of tab open."
"What's he do?" Lucky asked, his eyes narrowing. "He got a wife? Kids? Own his own house?"
"File says he's a Professor," The operatoranswered. "But I used to know agirl that stayed in his neighborhood, and none of those houses go for less thanhalf a million. And it says he'smarried."
"Take the bet," Lucky said. "If he wins, it'll just sweeten histaste for it. If he loses, and I'mbetting he'll lose, then we can start to turn screws on him and milk him alittle bit."
The operator nodded and left. He walked back to his cubicle and satdown. He took a deep breath, picked upthe headset, and put it over his ears. He adjusted the microphone to just the right position, and then clickedthe call off hold.
"Yes, Professor Mathis," The operator said in a practicedand neutral voice, "Sorry to keep you waiting, sir. I checked our records and your account is ingood standing. We'll take your calledbet of twenty thousand dollars for the number four race, number six horse, toplace first. Odds against are sixty toone on the official ticket. You'll getten to one here if you win, straight payout if you don't. We'll be in touch after the race."
The operator clickedthe stop button on the screen before him, ending the recording. He saved the file under the proper folderwith the gambler's last name and first initial. He placed the hand written copy with carbon copies in a file bin to hisright, and clicked his headset on to accept the next call.
"Good morning, Pearson guided tours," The operatorsaid into his headset, "How can I help you?"
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