Page 111 - The Jazzsipper Novel

110

THE JAZZ SIPPER

would come by just to hang out. They all began to jokingly envy his laid back
and private jobsite. But for Vance it was a blessing in disguise, he was able
to initiate his plan of running an onboard lottery with ease, so much so that he
even gave up the Filipino Bank Loan business.

His personal daily take was around $3,000.00 but the take overall daily
was about $6,000.00. After paying out the daily winners, the runners, sub-
runners and paying of some of the ships senior personal to not make the
onboard lottery an issue. The genius of the whole plan was nobody other than
Vance, knew who was actually running the lottery. Vance would always act
like it was others he had to get the bets too, before the daily numbers were
drawn. He would only keep a week’s profit onboard ship and that was in the
form of $700.00 money orders which was easy for him to conceal, the rest of
his money was being sent off the ship in $700.00 money orders by a New
Orleans homeboy who worked in the ships post office, which had a small crew
of postal clerks. Vance’s homeboy had told him that money orders were valid
for an unlimited period of time and that they could be cashed at any post office.

As Vance was sitting in the storeroom onboard the ship he began thinking
how less than two months ago he stepped aboard ship for a cruise that most
guys onboard hated and dreaded. But for Vance it was an opportunity of a
lifetime, he had roughly five months to go before they were back stateside and
if his calculations were right and he did not lose his mind like Larry said guys
did when they went overseas, he would have over $400,000.00 waiting on
him when he got back. And he would be around a month shy of his twentieth
birthday.