Chester, age five, along with his father, mother, and a sister, immigrated illegally to the United States from Poland as stowaways onboard a cargo ship. Having spent their life savings to secure safe passage, the family changed their name from Chudnofsky to Chester, and settled down in a single room in the heart of Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen. Chester would later say the run-down building where his family lived would have been condemned had it not been needed by the city to house the rats.

Eventually, Bernard Chester found employment in the garment district. However, the family’s good fortune proved short-lived. Carlo Gambino, of the Gambino crime family, assumed control over the district, and Bernard became a leader among those opposed to him. William had just turned eleven when his father, along with several others, was gunned down.

Penniless, Chester supported his family by sweeping floors in a plant wholesaler. Within a year, he had shown an unusual aptitude for stimulating plant health and growth, and was hired away by the Barlow Seed Company—first as a salesman, then as an assistant manager to Donald Barlow, who subsequently became his mentor. By the time William was thirty, he was managing the Barlow Company, which was by then among the twenty top-grossing operations of its kind.

When Barlow died suddenly and without family, his company passed to Chester. The subsequent growth of Chester Seed and Fertilizer, soon to be Chester Enterprises, put the company among the top ten in the industry worldwide.

Barlow died suddenly.

The phrase, from the Wikipedia article on William Chester, resonated in Lou’s mind. Over the final mile to the Chester mansion, he searched Donald Barlow on Google, then Yahoo, and finally Bing.

The third try was the charm.

A small article in a thirty-three-year-old issue of the Miami Herald reported the accidental death of seed giant Donald Barlow, who was washed overboard during a surprise squall while sailing aboard his fifty-two-foot yacht, Green Thumb.

The only other one on board at the time was Barlow Company executive William Chester, who immediately radioed the Coast Guard and followed their instructions. Despite Chester’s efforts, and an extensive sea and air search, Barlow’s body was not recovered. Police say that a cause of death hearing, routine in such deaths at sea, will be held in the near future.

William Chester, impeccably dressed in deck shoes, chinos, and a turquoise knit shirt, led the quartet to a conference room just off his study, offered them soft drinks and water, and motioned them to take any seats they wished around what looked to Lou like a mahogany table that might have cost the total of all the furniture he had ever owned.

“Well, gentlemen,” Chester said in a calm, authoritative voice, “I confess that I am rather shocked at the story as Chief Stone has related it to me. Suppose each of you give me your version. And please, take your time.”