RAYMOND Q. CHESTERFIELD CHAPTER 3

 

RAYMOND Q. CHESTERFIELD & ASSOC.

Chapter 3

The letter arrived at dawn, sealed with wax the color of dried blood. Raymond, already awake and brooding over his brandy (a habit he’d developed since Penelope’s arrival), cracked it open with a butter knife.  

"To the Esteemed Mr. Chesterfield," it read, "The Associates of Dustspur formally request collective bargaining rights, fair wages, and—"  

Raymond stopped reading. His monocle fogged with outrage.  

"A union?" he hissed, crumpling the paper. "In my company town?"  

Outside, the first shift of "associates" trudged to work, their boots kicking up dust that settled on the freshly painted sign: CHESTERFIELD ENTERPRISES – A SHARED VISION. The irony curdled in Raymond’s stomach.  

---  

Raymond was mid-panic when Penelope Fairweather strolled past his office window.  

He knew it was her—no other woman in Dustspur walked like a metronome set to the rhythm of his unraveling sanity. His hands fluttered like panicked doves, knocking over an inkwell. He dove behind his desk, monocle askew, cravat strangling him.  

Why? His brain screamed. You’ve swindled tycoons! You’ve invented three kinds of fraudulent insurance! Why does this woman—  

"Mr. Chesterfield?" Penelope’s voice lilted through the open window. "Are you... hiding?"  

Raymond popped up like a deranged jack-in-the-box, brandishing a ledger as if it could shield him. "Miss Fairweather! I was merely—ah—inspecting the floorboards. Termites. Nasty little capitalists, termites."  

Penelope’s lips curled. Not a smile—a prediction of future amusement. "How industrious of you."  

Raymond opened his mouth to say something devastatingly witty—  

CRASH.  

A drunk cowboy, one-eyed and swaying, straddled a bewildered bull outside the hardware store. "C’mon, Buttercup," he slurred, spurring the creature forward. "We got miles t’ride—"  

The bull disagreed. Violently.  

Wood splintered as 1,200 pounds of disgruntled beef plowed through the storefront, sending nails, hammers, and one screaming shopkeep airborne.  

Raymond gaped. Penelope arched a brow.  

"Well," she said, "I suppose someone’s investing in lumber futures today."  

Raymond’s heart did a thing that would’ve bankrupted a lesser man.  

Was she mocking him? Flirting? Both?  

The bull emerged, now wearing a straw hat and a look of profound regret. The cowboy clung to its back, hollering, "YEEHAW—" before they vanished in a cloud of dust and poor decisions.  

Penelope turned back to Raymond. "You’ve got ink," she said lightly, pointing to her own chin.  

Raymond touched his face. Smeared black. Perfect.  

As she walked away, hips swaying like a pendulum counting down his doom, Raymond realized two things:  

1. He would burn Dustspur to the ground if she asked.  

2. She knew it.  

Somewhere, Thaddeus Van Der Meer was taking notes.  

---  

Thaddeus Van Der Meer nearly spat out his sherry when Raymond explained his solution.  

"You’re going to do what?"  

"Sell them shares, Thaddeus," Raymond repeated, pacing his office like a caged panther. "Not in the bank, of course—God forbid—but in the town itself. The saloon, the stables, even the privies. We’ll call it… participatory equity."  

Thaddeus blinked. "You’re inventing a way for them to think they own things while you still do."  

Raymond adjusted his cravat, which had grown tighter since Penelope started wearing that lavender perfume. "Precisely. And if they’re squabbling over imaginary dividends, they won’t have time to unionize."  

---  

Raymond assembled the associates in the town square beneath a new banner: YOUR STAKE IN DUSTSPUR – LITERALLY.  

"Gentlemen!" he announced, gesturing to a chalkboard covered in numbers no one could read. "What if I told you that you could own a piece of Dustspur’s future?"  

Harlan Mackey crossed his arms, his biceps straining like overstuffed sausages. "We used to own our businesses ‘til you stole ‘em."  

"Reallocated," Raymond corrected. "And now, for the low price of ten percent of your wages, you can buy shares in Chesterfield Enterprises!" He flourished a stack of certificates, each embossed with a golden C. "As our town grows, so too will your investment!"  

A prospector scratched his beard. "So… we pay you to own what we already built?"  

Raymond beamed. "Exactly! And if you recruit others to buy shares, you earn commissions."  

The crowd murmured. The word "commissions" had the same effect as waving bacon at a starving dog.  

Penelope, leaning against the bank’s porch, arched an eyebrow. "You’ve monetized delusion," she murmured.  

Raymond’s pulse spiked. Damn her.  

---  

Within days, Dustspur descended into glorious chaos. Associates who’d once united against Raymond now turned on each other, accusing rivals of "hoarding shares" or "undermining market confidence." Fistfights erupted over whose stake in the brothel was more "premium."  

Harlan, ever the slow-burning fuse, stormed into the bank waving his certificate. "This says I own ‘one-hundredth of the stables,’ but the stables burned down last week!"  

Raymond didn’t look up from his ledger. "Ah, but you now own one-hundredth of the insurance payout. Congratulations."  

Harlan’s face purpled. "You slippery, monocled viper—"  

"Language, Mr. Mackey," Penelope interjected, not glancing up from her own ledger. "Or would you like your shares devalued for misconduct?"  

Harlan gaped. Raymond’s chest did something alarming.  

---  

Raymond’s loathing for his own weakness festered. He’d built an empire on cold calculation, yet here he was, approving Penelope’s every request like a lovesick clerk.  

When she suggested restructuring the "associate insurance" to actually cover injuries, he agreed.  

When she caught him inflating share values in the ledger, she erased his numbers and rewrote them—and he let her.  

Worst of all, she’d begun correcting his grammar.  

"You mean whom," she’d say, or "It’s fewer coins, not less." Each time, Raymond’s stomach performed a traitorous somersault.  

Thaddeus, of course, noticed. "You’ve gone soft, Chesterfield. Next, you’ll be giving them weekends off."  

Raymond drained his brandy. "Don’t be absurd."  

(He’d already drafted a "leisure equity" proposal. Damn her.)  

---  

The crisis came when Penelope discovered the real ledger—the one tracking how shares were worthless by design.  

She cornered Raymond in the vault, her voice low. "You do realize this is fraud?"  

He straightened his cuffs, avoiding her hazel eyes. "It’s speculative finance, Miss Fairweather. Entirely modern."  

"And when they realize their shares won’t ever pay out?"  

Raymond smirked. "Then we’ll sell them futures on the payouts."  

Penelope stared at him. Then, to his horror, she laughed—not the polite titter of a lady, but a full-throated, unguarded sound that rattled his monocle.  

"You’re awful," she said, grinning.  

Raymond’s heart did something catastrophic.  

---  

The associates finally revolted when Old Pete "sold" his share of the saloon to three different men. The ensuing brawl spilled into the street, where Harlan hoisted a pickaxe and bellowed:  

"Chesterfield’s playin’ us for fools! Shares, insurance, air rights—it’s all lies!"  

Raymond, watching from the bank’s window, sighed. "I’ll have to invent pensions next."  

Penelope appeared beside him, close enough that her sleeve brushed his. "Or," she said softly, "you could actually pay them."  

Raymond turned. Her expression was unreadable. For the first time in his life, he had no retort.  

Outside, the mob surged toward the bank.  

A tumbleweed crossed Dustspur at that moment.  

The mob hit the bank doors like a human battering ram. Splinters flew. Harlan Mackey led the charge, his pickaxe gleaming with righteous fury. Behind him, fifty-odd associates—red-faced, sweat-soaked, and finally wise to the con—howled for blood.  

Raymond Q. Chesterfield did three things in rapid succession:  

1. Downed the rest of his brandy.  

2. Adjusted his cravat.  

3. Grabbed Penelope’s wrist and hissed, "Play along."  

She didn’t pull away. Interesting.  

The doors burst open.  

"STRING HIM UP!" someone roared.  

"GENTLEMEN!" Raymond’s voice cut through the chaos like a scalpel. He stood atop his desk, arms spread, the very picture of wounded dignity. "Before you commit regicide against your own financial sovereign, might I offer you… dividends?"  

The mob hesitated. The word dividends had the same effect as shouting "FREE WHISKEY" in a temperance meeting.  

Harlan spat. "Ain’t fallin’ for more of your fancy words, Chesterfield."  

Raymond clutched his chest. "You wound me, Harlan. Truly. But ask yourself—why would I cheat you now, when Dustspur is this close to becoming the next San Francisco?" He snapped his fingers. "Penelope, the map."  

Penelope, with a look that promised retribution later, unrolled a ludicrously oversized map of Dustspur—now labeled "THE CHESTERFIELD DIVIDEND ZONE."  

Raymond pointed to a smudge near the creek. "Phase One: Aquatic Equity. We dam the creek, sell the water back to the railroad at a 300% markup, and you, my loyal shareholders, get quarterly payouts."  

The mob blinked.  

Old Pete scratched his head. "But… the creek’s free."  

"Exactly!" Raymond beamed. "That’s the magic of dividends. We monetize what no one thought to charge for." He gestured grandly to the saloon. "Phase Two: Atmospheric Royalties. Every time someone breathes heavily in the saloon—say, during a poker game—they pay a premium air tax. You get 20%."  

The men exchanged glances. The math was beyond them, but the promise of money for breathing short-circuited their rage.  

Harlan, ever the holdout, glowered. "And how do we know you won’t cheat us again?"  

Raymond sighed. "Because, my dear, suspicious Harlan, Miss Fairweather will oversee the Dividend Trust." He turned to Penelope with a smile that was equal parts surrender and scheming. "Unless, of course, she refuses…?"  

Penelope’s eyes narrowed. The room held its breath.  

Then—  

"I’ll do it," she said coolly. "Under two conditions."  

Raymond’s monocle fogged. "Name them."  

"One: Transparent ledgers. No more hidden columns."  

The associates gasped. Raymond’s eye twitched. "And the second?"  

Penelope leaned in, her whisper a blade at his throat: "You stop pretending you don’t adore me."  

Raymond’s pulse hammered like a runaway stock ticker.  

Outside, a tumbleweed rolled by. Somewhere, a cricket chirped.  

Then—  

"DONE!" Raymond bellowed, seizing Penelope’s hand and shaking it like a man closing the deal of his life. "The Chesterfield Dividend Era begins today!"  

The mob erupted in hesitant cheers. Harlan, outmaneuvered again, muttered, "I still don’t trust him."  

Penelope smirked. "Neither do I."  

And as the crowd dispersed—already arguing over who’d get the best percentage of the creek—Raymond realized with dawning horror that he’d just handed control of his empire to the one person who actually understood his schemes.  

Damn her.  

——ATILA——