‘HEY, FELLERS, WILL you just look who’s coming along here so high-faluting and head-in-the-air proud?’ requested a mocking voice with a well-educated New England accent. ‘It’s Mrs. Wild Bill Hickok in person!’
The comment was uttered by one of six young men who were grouped in an almost proprietary fashion outside Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon in Cheyenne. Although none showed any sign of caring, they were forming an obstruction to those people who were taking the air, either for business or pleasure, on that late July afternoon in 1876.
Fairly tall, slim, his good looks marred by an arrogant expression, reddy-brown Dundreary side-whiskers and a thin moustache which emphasized rather than improved a loose lipped mouth suggestive of a dissipated nature, the speaker was in his early twenties and obviously in superior financial straits to his companions. He wore a well cut, short, double-breasted black reefer jacket, all three buttons being left unfastened, a white silk shirt with an attached collar and embellished by a wide-knotted dark green tie, yellowish-brown Nankeen trousers and Hersome gaiter boots, the ensemble being completed by a brown billycock hat seated on the back of his head of longish hair. However, a black Western style gunbelt slanted downwards around his waist. In its holster, the tip of which was fastened to his right thigh, was an ivory-handled Colt Civilian Model Peacemaker.94
To eyes which could read the signs, the young man’s five companions were typical of the kind of loafers to be found in any fair-sized town west of the Mississippi River. Of varying heights and builds, they were all about the same age as the speaker. Although their attire might have implied they were cowhands to less initiated eyes, none had had more than as brief an association as possible with the frequently grueling work entailed by participation in the cattle business. One thing they all had in common, regardless of differences in their appearances, was that each wore a gunbelt with a bolstered revolver.
Under different circumstances, the beautiful features of the woman at whom the sneering words were directed would have been merry and pleasant, but they took on a frown of annoyance when she heard what was said. Perhaps five foot six in height and in her mid-thirties, she had a buxom, yet firm-fleshed figure with attractive contours and she walked gracefully, in a manner that suggested she possessed excellent physical health. A wide-brimmed white bonnet, to which was attached a cape-like bavolet offering shade for the neck, showed little of her brunette hair and framed her face. She had on a dark blue day-dress. The basquin bodice, buttoned to the waist, had its V-neckline and turned-down collar edged by a narrow lace frill. Its bell-shaped sleeves showed the sleeves of a white chemisette which were puffed and fastened at the wrists. Enhanced by multiple flouncing, the skirt was full to the ground and, except for brief glimpses of the toes, concealed her black high-buttoned shoes. Tight-fitting, short day gloves covered her hands, the left holding a reticule which matched her dress.
‘One thing’s very obvious,’ Agnes Hickok said scathingly, coming to a halt as the young men showed no sign of moving. ‘You all know my husband isn’t in town.’
‘It wouldn’t make no never mind to us good old boys if he was!’ declared David Ennals, the tallest of the Westerners.
‘He don’t spook us none, does he, Albie?’
‘He didn’t while he was here,’ Albert Booth stated, negligently brushing at the lapel of his reefer jacket and ignoring the fact that he and his companions had steered well clear of James Butler ‘Wild Bill’ Hickok since the day the famous gun-fighter had taken residence in Cheyenne. ‘And, from what I saw of him, “Tired Old Bill” would have been a better name.’
‘You-all want for me to swat a couple of ’em, seeing’s you’s a lady and can’t, Miz Agnes?’ inquired the large black woman who had been walking and talking with Mrs. Hickok until the interruption. She sounded hopeful. She had a spotted bandana knotted around her head and the arms which emerged from the rolled-up sleeves of her gingham dress were well muscled. There was an angry expression on her broad, normally jovial face as she went on, ‘ ’Cause that’s all they’s worth, the shiftless good-for-nothings.’
‘Watch your mouth, you uppity nigger!’ ordered Royston Hattersley, his accent that of one who had been raised in Kansas. ‘We don’t take that kind of lip from your kind.’
‘I’m whiter’n you, seeing’s I wash more regular,’ commented a feminine voice from the opposite side of the quintet to the two women. ‘And I don’t reckon any one of you’re worth somebody pissing in your face was your mouth on fire.’
Incensed by the disrespectful statement from a member of the ‘weaker’ sex, the five young men turned to find out who was addressing them in such a fashion. They had no trouble in identifying the speaker. Even if the people closest to her had not started to back away hurriedly, she would have stood out in that—or any other—crowd.
A battered and faded blue U.S. Cavalry kepi tilted jauntily on a mop of shortish, curly red hair. It topped a freckled, tanned, pretty face with sparkling—or, at that moment, disdainfully flashing—blue eyes, a slightly snub nose and a full lipped mouth which was set in unsmiling lines despite the grin quirks at the corners. Like her headdress, all her attire was masculine; but what it clothed definitely belonged to a person of feminine gender. A fringed buckskin shirt clung like a second skin, the swell of an imposing bosom forced the open neck apart to a level that let it be seen she did not consider undergarments a necessity, and the sleeves were turned up to above the elbows of a pair of strong arms. Trimming down without needing artificial aids, her waist widened to curvaceous buttocks and sturdy, shapely legs emphasized rather than concealed by buckskin trousers which—like the shirt—gave the impression of having been bought a size too small and further shrunk in washing. Her raiment was completed by a pair of Pawnee moccasins and a brown gunbelt slanting down from her left hip to where an ivory-handled Colt 1851 Navy revolver rode butt forward in a low cavalry-twist holster held by a pigging thong to her right thigh. On the left side of her waist belt, its handle tucked through a broad leather hoop, hung a coiled and long-lashed bull whip which looked far more functional than decorative.
‘What the hell is it?’ asked Mike Leigh; a thickset and ugly young man whose voice implied an upbringing in Nebraska.
‘I’ll damned sure find out!’ promised gangling Chris Hitchens, being nearest to the contemptuously voiced speaker and, followed by Leigh, he started to slouch forward in a manner redolent of menace.
Although the young man attained his intention, it was not in the way he envisaged or desired!
Bringing up her left arm, the girl deflected the blow Hitchens threw at her. Then, exhibiting an equal dexterity and the precision of a male pugilist, she whipped over her clenched right fist to connect with the side of his jaw. It was propelled with sufficient power to send him in a sprawling rush, compelling Leigh to jump aside hurriedly, until he collapsed on the sidewalk at his other companions’ feet.
Despite having avoided being struck by Hitchens, Leigh failed to achieve any more satisfactory a result from his point of view. He threw himself forward with outstretched hands, but they closed on nothing more substantial than the space occupied until a moment before by his intended victim. Having stepped clear without allowing him to grab her, she turned to deliver a kick to the seat of his pants as he blundered by. Sent staggering onwards, he contrived to prevent himself from falling by catching hold of and clinging to the saloon’s hitching rail.
‘Get her!’ Booth yelled, conscious of how much the liberties he and his companions were allowed to take around the town depended, in part at least, upon their reputation for being tough.
Being equally cognizant of the point, Hattersley was already rushing forward. Like his predecessors, however, he found the girl was exceptionally well able to protect herself against such reckless tactics. She came to meet him, in an act he had not contemplated, catching his left wrist in both hands to tug at it so hard he momentarily thought the limb would be wrenched from its socket. The apprehension was only briefly retained, then he had other problems to displace it.
Swiveling around, without relinquishing her grasp, the redhead caused Hattersley to make a hurried and involuntary turn in a half circle. On being released unexpectedly, he went in an arm-flailing and uncontrollable rush in the direction from which he had come. Showing the kind of loyalty he was aware he could expect, the remaining three of his companions sprang aside and allowed him to reel onwards unchecked. He found his progress halted by another means, but it was not the one he would have selected. Caught by the right shoulder with a massive black hand, he received a shake of such violence that it rattled his teeth together. Then he was flung, apparently effortlessly, towards the knot of people who were watching. Although he crashed into the wall of the saloon with some force, he had sufficient control over his faculties to splutter a furious obscenity and grab at the revolver in his holster. Seeing that Mrs. Hickok’s maid had not turned to keep him under observation, he was confident he could avenge the treatment he had received from her and the redhead.
Having disposed of her third attacker with the same efficiency that had saved her from the other two, the girl clearly did not assume there would be no more attempts forthcoming. Using her turning momentum after releasing Hattersley’s arm, she darted across the sidewalk. Slapping her left hand on to the hitching rail, she vaulted over it and, on alighting, backed into the center of the street. It was obvious, however, that she did not contemplate the flight which might have struck some people as being an advisable precaution. Instead, she turned to face the sidewalk and, with arms akimbo, stood on spread apart feet in a posture of challenge.
‘Come on, damn it!’ Booth ordered Ennals and Ben Murray, the heavy-set and unprepossessing sixth member of his party, taking the lead by jumping to the street through the opening left between the two sections of the saloon’s hitching rails which gave access to the front entrance.
Snarling in fury, Mike Leigh began to thrust himself away from the portion of the hitching rail against which he had stumbled. His intention of rejoining and accompanying his three companions in tackling the girl came to nothing. Taking his first step, he felt something hook around his rear ankle and tug it upwards. Thrown off balance, he went sprawling to the sidewalk.
‘Land-sakes a-mercy!’ gasped the author of the young man’s misfortune, in an almost plaintive feminine Southron drawl indicative of a good upbringing. ‘Did I do that, for shame?
While asking the rhetorical question, the speaker deftly liberated the crook of the parasol with which she had tripped Leigh. Equaling the red head in height and a few years older, she presented a less attractive sight. In fact, she had a mousy demeanor which matched her tone. Stringy brunette hair, taken into an unflattering bun and upon which an unadorned dark blue ‘jockey’ hat sat with almost military squareness, did nothing to improve pallid features which a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles and a somewhat large nose already placed at a disadvantage. Any improvements her figure might have offered were effectively concealed by a shapeless dark blue two-piece traveling costume. A plain black reticule that was bulky rather than dainty dangled from her left hand, which was gloved and so her marital status was hidden.
Rolling over, spitting out more obscenities, Leigh began to rise. His intentions of prior to the fall were forgotten or, at least, shelved until after he had done something to repay the indignity he had just suffered.
At the other side of the gap in the hitching rails, Royston Hattersley was also being thwarted in his desire to take revenge. Even as his fingers were closing on the butt of the revolver, he felt his wrist caught in a grasp as powerful as the one inflicted by the big black woman upon his shoulder and a solemn sounding voice with the accent of a Texan came to his ears.
‘Like the Good Book says, brother; dispute not in violence, else violence is plumb likely to come right back and copper your bet!’
Possessing little more knowledge of the Bible except that it existed, Hattersley did not know whether the quotation was to be found in its pages. Nor was he particularly interested at that moment. Instead, he swung his furious gaze around and prepared to take punitive action against the man who had uttered it. What he saw lead him to assume, despite the strength with which his arm was being held, he would have little difficulty in doing so.
Of medium height and in his early thirties, the deliverer of the quotation had a heavily mustached, ruggedly good looking face that seemed as solemn as his voice had suggested. Apart from the black Texas-style J.B. Stetson hat tilted back to show rusty red hair and a pair of black, sharp toed, high heeled cowhand boots, his attire—a black three-piece suit, white shirt with an attached collar and sober dark blue necktie—was such as a member of one of the stricter minor religious sects frequently wore. However, if he was ordained in such a sect, he clearly believed in the church militant. At his right side, riding slightly higher than was usual on a two and a half inches wide and stiff belt, was a Rogers & Spencer Army Model revolver with bell shaped black walnut grips in an open fronted, spring retention holster of unconventional design.
Filled with anger at being accosted in such a manner, Hattersley’s only thoughts regarding the Rogers & Spencer was that the way in which it was carried appeared poorly positioned for rapid withdrawal. Nor did he let the possibility that he might be in contention with a member of the cloth influence his actions. Snatching free his wrist, he swung around and lashed a punch with the solemn face as its target.
Watching Booth leading the trio from the sidewalk, the red-head proved she was far from as imprudent as her behavior implied. Going across, her right hand closed on and drew free the handle of the bull whip. Swinging her arm around, she caused the long lash to uncoil and, reversing the limb’s direction, sent it outwards as neatly as a master fly fisherman casting a double tapered line to a waiting trout.
Except that the effect was less pacific!
Guided by either luck or considerable skill, the whip’s lash wrapped around Booth’s ankles while he was in mid-leap and snapped them together. What little equilibrium he had left as he alighted was ruined by the girl jerking sharply on the handle and causing him to topple backwards. Proving that skill rather than chance had produced the effect, she freed and brought back the lash ready for further use as he lost his balance.
In one respect, Booth might have counted himself fortunate as he tumbled into the hands of his companions. Catching him by the arms, they saved him from what might have been a dangerous fall. Having done so, they hoisted him erect and pushed him towards their intended victim. Then, spreading out to offer divergent targets intended to confuse the girl, they followed him.
Halfway to his feet, Leigh became aware that two menacing figures were moving past the be-spectacled woman. Although they wore the attire of working cowhands, they had moccasins on their feet. Each was tall, lean, yet powerful looking, with black hair and a deeply tanned aquiline face indicative of a proportion of Indian blood. They were each armed with a revolver in a fast draw holster and a sheathed knife of impressive size.
Catching the young man by his arms, the pair hoisted him erect with no more observable difficulty than if he had been a new born baby. Before he could decide upon what action he might take, they flung him in a whirling rush along the sidewalk. By doing so, they added to the further misfortunes about to befall Chris Hitchens as he was getting up from where the red-head’s blow had knocked him.
Showing an aptitude equal to that exhibited by the buckskin clad girl earlier, the solemn-featured man blocked his assailant’s attempt to strike him and retaliated just as effectively. Rising with considerable power, a set of hard knuckles took Hattersley under the jaw. Knocked backwards, he passed without drawing any conclusions from Agnes Hickok’s actions, between her and her maid. The manner in which he had been struck sent him in an uncontrollable spin, offering the advantage of allowing him to see where he was going. In spite of the information this supplied, he found he could do nothing to avert what he knew was forthcoming.
Converging rapidly upon Hitchens, with Leigh approaching if anything more precipitously from the other side, Hattersley tried in vain to escape the inevitable. They came together with considerable force and a precision which might have been created by weeks of rehearsal. Letting out mutually profane and alarmed howls, they collided and went down in a heap of tangled, flailing limbs. Grinning broadly, the maid strode forward and flopped her far from light weight down to sit on top of the pile they had made.
Advancing across the street in a rough arrowhead formation, the remnants of the hard-cases were putting the redhead on the horns of a dilemma. For all her confidence in being able to handle the whip skillfully, she realized its limitations as a means of defense under the present circumstances. No matter at which of the trio she struck, the other two would be able to close to a proximity at which the lash would be useless. The matter was taken out of her hands, however, as was the need to select the next man to receive her attentions.
Showing a justifiable reluctance to receive a blow from the whip, Ennals sought to prevent it by reaching for his holstered revolver. It was an act, if he had given the matter any thought, calculated to bring about what he was trying to avoid. In addition to drawing the red head’s attention to him, it settled his hope that the way she had toppled Booth was a fluke. Sending the lash snaking forward, she proved that the rapidity she was employing in no way detracted from her aim. Hard, yet supple, plaited leather encircled his wrist with a numbing constriction and caused him to miss the weapon’s butt.
The sharp crack of a light caliber revolver mingled with the yelp of pain that was forced from Ennals, both being echoed by a startled yell as Murray felt the bullet tear off his hat. An instant later, although Booth had somehow contrived to retain his billycock so far, another shot sounded and it was sent spinning from his head. Each of them swung around to glare in the direction from which the bullets had come. What they saw prevented either from attempting to complete the draw he had commenced.
Standing at the edge of the sidewalk, Agnes Hickok was demonstrating that Wild Bill was not the only member of their family to possess ability in the use of firearms. Retaining the double handed hold she had adopted on taking it from her reticule, she had already cocked the hammer of the profusely engraved Colt Model of 1862 Police Pistol and was turning its four and a half inch barrel so it menaced Booth and Murray equally. What was more, as the weapon was a revolver despite its official name, each was aware there were almost certainly more bullets in the cylinder and concluded these could be dispatched with no less accuracy if necessary.
‘I think-that’s just about enough from you!’ Agnes stated calmly.
‘All right!’ put in a female voice with an English accent, its tone filled with indignation and suggesting the speaker was used to being obeyed. ‘What the hell’s going on?’
Unless illiterate, there was no excuse for a stranger to fail to identify the woman who was stalking from Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon as the person who had supplied part of its name. Nor, if it came to a point, was it hard to discern why the name was given to the establishment even without needing to enter. Flanked by posters advising the citizens of Cheyenne to vote for Hubert Kretzmer for mayor, she was depicted on life-size placards—clad in a sleeveless bodice, black tights and calf length heel-less boots, in the stance of a masculine pugilist and wearing boxing gloves—at each side of the building’s main entrance.
Seen in the flesh, Battling Binnie Gates was even more impressive than her portraits. Slightly over five foot six in height, her hair hung to just below shoulder level in what a later generation would call a ‘flip’ style and was remarkably blonde for her something over forty years of age. There was no visible evidence about her features, as to how she had acquired her sobriquet, nor any suggestion of exactly how old she might be. She was good looking, even though her features suggested an arrogant and self-willed nature. She had prominent lips that might a few years earlier have been indicative of sultry promise. Clad in a scarlet dress that was revealing to the point of being indecorous, she had a very full figure. However, the extreme décolleté left no doubt that there was nothing except flesh and bone beneath the upper portion of the garment and a bulkily shapely leg showed tantalizingly through the waist length slit in the skirt, encased in a black silk stocking and ending in a high heeled silver colored slipper.
Two men were following Binnie and each, in his own way, was almost as well-known as she was to those spectators who were residents of Cheyenne.
At the left, the candidate for mayor of the town was not an inspiring physical specimen. While it was unlikely anybody would guess he was fifty-five, few people would have thought he was much less. Of moderate height and build, clad in expensive town dweller’s clothes to which he did no justice, he had a balding grey head and a thin, pallid, sanctimonious face which suggested a mid-European origin and was not enhanced by a thin moustache. Darting glances about him as he emerged from the saloon, it was obvious he disapproved of everything he was seeing.
The second man was close to four inches taller than Kretzmer and about twenty years younger, and unless his attire lied, he was a successful professional gambler. Certainly he was as elegant as his companion was dowdy. Carrying an ebony colored walking stick in his right hand—which, like its mate, was embellished by diamond rings as large as those sparkling on the woman’s fingers and wrists—although nobody had ever seen him place its ferrule on the ground, he sported a pearl handled and nickel plated Colt Storekeeper Model Peacemaker in a cross draw holster on the left side of his well-polished black waist belt. He was, as the majority of the onlookers knew, Warren Gates and, in addition to being Binnie’s husband, he was acknowledged as a coming man in the affairs of the town. There were also those who, with varying depths of profanity depending upon how much they had suffered at his far from scrupulous or gentle hands, would have attested to his completely ruthless nature.
‘Well?’ Binnie demanded, bringing her gaze to rest upon the wife of Wild Bill Hickok. ‘What’s it all about?’
‘Your brother and his friends have been up to their usual tricks, Mrs. Gates,’ Agnes replied, her tone indicating that the dislike implied by the blonde’s demeanor was mutual. She did not take the Colt from its alignment or look around sufficiently long to allow the men at whom it was pointed to take advantage of the lapse in vigilance. ‘Only this time they’ve bitten off more than they can chew.’
‘Their usual tricks?’ Binnie challenged, continuing to show an animosity that was apparent to everybody in the vicinity.
‘Blocking the sidewalk and generally making nuisances of themselves,’ Agnes elaborated, provoking a rumble of concurrence from the assembled spectators. Her voice hardened as she went on, ‘And if your brother tries to pull the gun he’s fingering, I’ll put a bullet in his knee which will stop him ever being able to duplicate your—ability—in the boxing ring.’
‘Stop scratching yourself, Albie, or Mrs. Hickok might jump to the wrong conclusion and start shooting for no reason like her husband’s been known to,’ Binnie ordered, her cheeks having reddened. There was only one thing annoyed her more than having what had clearly been a doubt cast upon her ability as a boxer. That was for somebody she knew to be aware of the true situation suggest a direct blood-link between herself and her half-brother. She knew Agnes had learned he was her father’s son by a second marriage and they had only met for the first time since her arrival in the United States from England. As the young man obeyed, although more in response to the threat he felt sure would be carried out than from a desire to please her, she swung her gaze to where the big black woman was still seated upon the weakly struggling and gasping trio. ‘Hey you. Get up!’
‘Don’t recollect’s how you pays me my wages,’ the maid answered calmly. ‘Which means I don’t take no orders from you-all. What does you want me to do, Miz Agnes?’
‘Get up, please, Mattie,’ the brunette answered, lowering the revolver although she kept it in her hands.
‘Whatever you says,’ the maid assented, rising and ignoring the hate-filled glare being directed at her by the buxom blonde. ‘They wasn’t so all-fired comfortable to sit on, anyways.’
‘My wife asked what was going on!’ Warren Gates put in, his accent telling he had been born in the East Side of New York, as he stepped to Binnie’s side. ‘So it’s time she was given an answer.’
‘Well now,’ a laconic and drawling voice remarked, before any reply was forthcoming. ‘With all due respect to Miz Gates, I’d say it was up to me to do such questioning. Just put up your gun, Miz Agnes and you, Calam-gal, come on over here so’s I can get to doing it.’
Even before Binnie and her husband looked at the two men who were approaching, they knew who had spoken. It was not the big, jovial looking, heavily built and well-dressed Harlon Drysdale, currently mayor of Cheyenne, but the other who had made the comment.
Ambling in the manner of one long used to sitting on a horse, Marshal Grover Rymer was tall, lean and leathery looking. His hair might be grey, but he had the keen-eyed expression of a man much younger than his fifty-odd years. Clad in clean, if not new, range clothes, he had his badge of office to the left breast of his calfskin vest and the Colt Civilian Model Peacemaker holstered at his right thigh had its walnut grips worn by considerable use.
If any of the people who were gathered in front of the saloon had had eyes for other than the group who were the center of attraction, they might have noticed that—although he had been in conversation with the mayor and marshal as they walked along prior to his intervention—the solemn man did not accompany them as they went forward.
‘There’s some might think,’ Gates stated loudly, as if addressing a political rally. ‘That, with a peace officer on hand, it shouldn’t have been allowed to start in the first place.
‘Well now,’ Rymer answered, directing a contemptuous glance to where the three young men on the sidewalk were untangling themselves slowly and painfully. ‘Happen I’d’ve been a mite closer, I might’ve been able to stop it. Only, seeing’s I’m not so spry’s I used to be—like some’ve been spreading the word around town—damned if it wasn’t all over bar the shouting afore I could get here. But, like you-all ’n’ Miz Gates, I’d admire to know what happened.’
‘I suppose you’re set on proving Albie and his mates started it,’ Binnie accused, her attitude showing as much animosity towards the marshal and mayor as it had for Agnes.
‘I’m set on finding out who did,’ Rymer corrected, as he and his companion came to a halt and looked at the buckskin clad girl. ‘How about it, Calam?’
‘Well now, I wouldn’t go so far’s say it was them,’ the redhead replied, indicating her would-be assailants with a sweeping gesture from her whip filled right hand. Having released the lash from Ennals’ wrist, which subsequently proved to be broken, she was coiling it as—ensuring she did not come between Agnes and the three men on the street—she walked forward. ‘But, what they was doing, they sure’s hell’s for sinners looked to be asking for somebody to, which I obliged.’ Her gaze flickered to the mayor and she continued, ‘Howdy, Mr. Drysdale, I was looking for you to let you know I’ve brought in that load of supplies you ordered.’
‘Supplies!’ Binnie scoffed, studying the girl’s attire, which was just as revealing as her own. ‘That’s a new name for it. Who do you think you are, Calamity Jane?’
‘No,’ the red-head answered, stepping on to the sidewalk and returning the handle of the whip to the belt loop. ‘I don’t think, I know I’m Calamity Jane.’
‘You are, are you?’ Binnie barked, allowing a note of disbelief into her tone although something told her she had heard the truth. ‘And is bringing in the Mayor’s supplies all he’s had you come for?’
‘What else have you in mind?’ Calamity demanded, her gaze flickering from the blonde to the placards and back.
‘I wondered, you being so tough from all accounts,’ Binnie answered, speaking in a carrying voice. ‘If he might have brought you in to take up my challenge.’
‘I most certainly did—!’ Drysdale began, but was not permitted to finish his denial.
‘I’ve allus been one for taking up a challenge,’ Calamity put in. ‘So what’d it be?’
‘To get in the ring with me,’ Binnie answered. ‘And see how long you can last before I flatten you, or have you crying for me to quit.’
‘Well now,’ Calamity replied, the light of battle glowing in her eyes. ‘I reckon’s how I might just give it a whirl. So, any time you’re wanting, let’s me and you get in that ring of your’n and see who gets flattened, or starts crying to quit!’
‘Blast you, Calam!’ the solemn-faced man growled, sounding and looking like a particularly strict bishop confronted by a consistent sinner. ‘If anybody can stir things up faster and wilder than you, I hope I never get to meet them.’
‘Don’t you go mean-mouthing me, Solly Coles!’ Miss Martha ‘Calamity Jane’ Canary protested, the introductions which had been performed a few minutes earlier having shown it was all right for her to use the speaker’s real, if abbreviated, name. There was a suggestion of genuine liking for him beneath the note of asperity in her voice as she continued, ‘What the he—What should I have done when that half-dressed, big-ti… lard-gutted, white-haired tail-peddler called me down, back off like she scared the shi… like she scared me?’
The changes in the red-head’s spirited response, mild as they were compared with some of the expletives to which she could put tongue when an occasion demanded, were made out of deference for where and in whose company the conversation was taking place.
Two hours had elapsed since the fracas outside Battling Bonnie’s Ring Saloon. What amounted to a council of war was being held in the private living accommodation of the small hotel which had been purchased as a home and business by Mr. & Mrs. James Butler ‘Wild Bill’ Hickok. In addition to the speakers, Agnes, Mayor Drysdale, Marshal Rymer and half a dozen of Cheyenne’s most prominent citizens were present. The latter group were among the mayor’s stoutest supporters in his campaign to stay in office. That factor and recent developments had led them to seek him out with the disturbing news which had provoked the exchange between the girl and United States Marshal Solomon Wisdom ‘Solly’ Cole, although as yet his official status was known only to her, Agnes, Drysdale and the local peace officer.95
Being aware of how delicate the situation was with the municipal elections so close, and mindful of rumors which had been circulated since the campaign commenced regarding the possibility of his showing hostility to those who opposed his and Drysdale’s return to office, Rymer had shown masterly tact in the way he handled the aftermath of the fracas. While satisfied Calamity was justified—if impulsive and ill-advised—with her intervention, he had craftily left the onus of responsibility for whatever action he had to take upon Binnie and Warren Gates. Or rather on the six young men known to be their adherents, which amounted to the same thing. When asked whether they wished to have the girl and the others who had been involved arrested for assaulting them, Albert Booth had clearly been on the point of answering in the affirmative. He was prevented from doing so by a furious glare from his half-sister and a prohibitive head shake by her equally reluctant husband, who knew his bullying and vindictive nature just as well as she did. Both appreciated, although he did not, how the response would be received by the onlookers if he insisted upon the charges being enforced.
On receiving Booth’s negative reply, albeit given reluctantly, the marshal had requested the onlookers to disperse. Before this could be done, Binnie had prevented an immediate departure by returning to the subject of the challenge she had made and had had accepted by Calamity. Repeating the suggestion that Drysdale had brought the girl to Cheyenne for just such a purpose, she had asked if he would be willing to help put up a ‘purse’ to reimburse the winner. Her husband had offered to donate one thousand dollars and, being aware of how adversely public sentiment could be affected by a refusal, the mayor was compelled to donate a similar amount. Asked if he also wished to make a side bet on the outcome, his hesitancy produced an offer of five to one odds from Binnie. Goaded by his awareness of the audience’s reaction and being by nature a gambler, he had agreed. However, his intention of restricting the wager to a moderate sum came to nothing. Mocking comments about his lack of faith in his contender had led him to match the two thousand five hundred dollars proposed by Gates.
The matter had not ended with the completion of the arrangements and dispersal of the crowd. Nor was it likely to have done. Such an unusual sporting contest would have been of tremendous interest under any conditions. That its principals were from opposing sides in the forthcoming and hotly contended municipal elections gave the affair an added zest. In a remarkably short time, there was hardly a person in Cheyenne who had not been informed that Calamity Jane and Battling Binnie Gates were to ‘have it out’ with each other in the boxing ring, three minute rounds to a finish instead of to a set number, that evening at nine o’clock.
It transpired that more than just the news had been passed around.
Visiting each of Drysdale’s main supporters individually, Gates had induced six of them to respectively wager considerable sums of money on the girl at the same odds offered by his wife. Nor had the gambling on the event been restricted to them. Apart from the multitude of transactions being carried out all over the town and which were not connected to the actual participants, Gates had men going around taking bets from anybody who wished to accept the odds. Having been approached, without his official status being exposed, Cole had mentioned the matter to Rymer. Both were experienced peace officers and, sensing something suspicious might be afoot, they had visited the businessmen known to support Drysdale. Collecting the mayor and those of his adherents who were involved, on learning the extent of the wagering, they had come to the Hickok Hotel where Calamity had taken a room. On being informed of the reason for the visit, its proprietor had offered the privacy of her living quarters in which to discuss the matter.
‘I don’t see you backing off, anyway, Calam,’ Agnes stated. ‘Not if all Jim has told me about you is true.’
‘No more she would,’ Cole declared in a somber voice. ‘I mind one time she let a gal who she’d caught after trying to rob a stage she was on get the jump on her just so she could find out who was toughest.’
‘She’d whomped me on my head first time we met!’ the red-head pointed out in exculpation, but made no attempt to refute the accusation.96 ‘Anyways, don’t tell me you begrudge a hard working gal a mite of fun, now do you?’
‘Fun!’ yelped one of the businessmen, who had wagered considerably more than was wise upon Calamity being victorious. ‘Is that all you regard this as, fun?’
‘Easy, Barney!’ Drysdale injected soothingly. ‘We’ve all heard tell how Calam can hold up her end in a fight should she need.’
‘Well, yes,’ Barney Josephson admitted, considering and deciding it might be inadvisable to mention there was one occasion when the red-head had suffered a defeat in a fight with another woman.97 ‘But she’s not a trained boxer like Binnie Gates.’
‘I one time took on and whupped a gal’s was reckoned to be woman fist fighting “champeen” of the whole damned world,’ Calamity pointed out, having considerable pride in her prowess in such matters.
‘But was that in a ring and under rules, Calam?’ Agnes inquired, feeling sure such an event would have been accorded considerable mention in the newspapers or magazines which devoted space to highly spiced accounts of the girl’s activities and unable to recollect ever having seen reference to it.
‘Well, no,’ Calamity confessed, grinning a little at the memory. ‘It was tooth ’n’ claw again’ her and a gal who set us to fighting, but I had a cute lil schoolma’am backing my play.’98
‘Boxing in a ring’s different—I should imagine,’ Agnes warned, although the second portion of a statement which began in a fashion suggesting knowledge, or experience in such matters, appeared to have been inserted as an afterthought. ‘I know the exhibitions Mrs. Gates has given while she’s been here have always been against girls who work for her, but from what I’ve s… heard, she’s a competent enough performer.’
‘Likely,’ Calamity admitted amiably, having taken a great liking to the woman who was married to an old and valued friend and whose expert handling of a revolver had saved her from a precarious situation. ‘But I’m a heap younger, I’ll bet fitter and, by cracky, I reckon’s I can take anything she can hand out ’n’ give back a whole heap more.’
‘But she’s a trained boxer!’ Josephson reiterated.
‘Do you reckon you’ll have any trouble with those big gloves you’ll be using, Calam?’ Drysdale inquired, remembering the equipment he had seen employed in the exhibition bouts put on by Binnie since her arrival in Cheyenne.
‘Not so long’s they don’t stop me hitting her just’s hard’s I can,’ the red-head declared confidently.
‘It’s not as if the bout is over a set number of rounds and with points being awarded to get a winner if there isn’t a decision,’ Agnes went on, showing what might have been considered a surprising knowledge of how boxing matches were generally conducted. ‘And, with Wally Siddons as referee, it will be fair enough.’
‘There’s nothing more certain than that!’ Drysdale asserted, knowing the man in question was not only a noted referee who was frequently called upon to officiate at major male boxing bouts throughout Wyoming and the surrounding States, but was also one of his supporters in the election. ‘And, like Calam said, she’s younger and fitter than Binnie Gates. So all she has to do is keep going until Binnie’s all tuckered out and she’ll win.’
Listening to the mutter of concurrence, in which Josephson gave only slightly grudging support, Solly Cole was worried. Not so much over Calamity’s welfare, as he shared the mayor’s confidence in her ability to succeed under those conditions, but because he realized that more than a considerable sum of money was hanging on the outcome. If she was defeated, it would almost certainly cause Drysdale to lose the election and see Rymer, a competent and scrupulously honest lawman, removed from office. What was more, from all he had heard of them and deduced outside the saloon, he could not imagine Binnie and Warren Gates offering odds of five to one, or taking the large sums which had been wagered, unless they believed she was certain of victory.
‘We’ve got her, Warrie,’ Albert Booth announced triumphantly, as he entered the owners’ private office at the rear of Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon shortly after half past six in the evening. Then, because it went against the grain for him to give praise to anybody, his tone lost some of its enthusiasm as he elaborated, ‘She went to the livery barn to ’tend to her horses just as you said she would.’
‘I told you she would, Mr. Gates!’ Hubert Kretzmer put in, reluctant to allow the saloonkeeper to be credited with his deductions. ‘Did you have any trouble?’
‘Naw!’ Booth scoffed, eyeing the politician with thinly disguised disdain. ‘Chris and Mike jumped her while she was fetching hay for the horses.’
‘Did she see either of them?’ Kretzmer demanded.
‘No.’ Booth replied. ‘Chris gave her a bang on the head from behind and before she got her wits about her again, they’d put her in a couple of sacks, with a gag over her mouth and trussed up like a turkey ready for the oven at Thanksgiving.’99
‘Where is she now?’ Warren Gates inquired, having an even lower opinion than Kretzmer of the intelligence of Booth and his cronies.
Tn the buggy out back,’ the young man answered, with the air of one expecting approbation for work well done.
None was forthcoming!
‘Then tell the stupid bastards to get her the hell away from here!’ Gates bellowed, springing to his feet while his wife and Kretzmer exhibited just as much alarm. ‘I said for them to take her to that cabin along Grow Greek when they got her.’
‘S … sure, Warrie!’ Booth gulped, being too aware of the saloonkeeper’s far from amiable disposition when crossed or roused to raise any arguments.
‘You remembered to bring away that buckskin saddle-horse of hers and any of her gear that was with the wagon, didn’t you?’ Kretzmer asked, as the young man began to turn.
‘Yes we did,’ Booth confirmed, showing more indignation than would have been the case if the question had come from his half-sister or her husband. ‘She hadn’t took her war bag to the Hickoks’ so we brought it along like Warrie told us.’
‘Good!’ Gates grunted, having hoped to receive the latter piece of information and slightly mollified by the way in which the latter part of it had been given. ‘Tell them to get her to the cabin and stay with her.’
‘Sure, Warrie,’ Booth assented.
‘And tell those mates of yours to forget any ideas they’ve got about paying her back for what she did to them outside,’ Binnie Gates put in, her tones coldly menacing. ‘Or having what they might think is fun with her. I want her in good shape when she comes back. Tell them you’ll be bringing a couple of the girls to look after her later tonight and to make bloody sure she doesn’t see any of them, or hear any names that would help her say who’s involved.’
‘I’ll see to it,’ Booth promised with a touch of asperity, disliking the repetition of orders he had already been given.
‘But, after the election tomorrow, it’ll not matter any too much whether she can, or can’t.’
‘The hell it won’t!’ Gates contradicted savagely and Kretzmer nodded vehement agreement. ‘You do as you’re told and leave the thinking to those with brains for it.’
‘God damn it, Warrie,’ Binnie complained, after her half-brother had fled from the room even more precipitately than he had entered. ‘I still don’t see why you can’t just let me have her in the ring tonight and hammer seven shades of shit out of her.’
‘I’ve told you why!’ Kretzmer put in, before the blonde’s husband could speak. His voice had a grating whine which did little to enamor him to prospective voters, or to promote a friendly atmosphere even with the people upon whom he was depending to acquire the requisite support to win the election as mayor on the following day. ‘After the way your brother and those other fools behaved outside, just doing that might not be enough.’
‘We’ll win all the bets,’ Binnie pointed out, finding the would-be civic official’s condescending attitude as irritating as it always was in her dealings with him.
‘We’ll win them anyway,’ Kretzmer countered, wanting to establish that he expected a share of the money and having the kind of mentality which detested any argument or disputing of his wishes by people he considered to be underlings hired to do his bidding. ‘The bets will be forfeit by default when she doesn’t show up, but that won’t be the end of it. Even the people who haven’t bets down, are going to blame Drysdale for their disappointment when Canary doesn’t come and fight.’
‘She’ll come straight back here when she gets loose,’ Gates continued. ‘So you’ll be able to get her into the ring then and, that way, we’ll get two dips into the cracker barrel instead of one.’
‘The second time’ll get even more attention and a bigger crowd,’ Binnie mused, half to herself. ‘Because everybody will know it’s going to be a real, out and out grudge fight to a finish.’
‘She’s nowhere to be found!’ U.S. Marshal Solly Cole announced, coming into the living quarters at the Hickoks’ hotel. ‘Her gear and the buckskin aren’t at the livery barn and nobody there’s seen hide nor hair of her! She hasn’t even finished feeding her team.’
‘Then something’s happened to her!’ Agnes Hickok stated and her maid nodded vigorous concurrence, the possibility of Calamity Jane having been afraid to go through with the boxing bout and fleeing from the town never occurring to either of them. ‘And, in that case, Binnie Gates and her husband know what it is.’
‘You-all won’t get any argument from me on that!’ Cole declared, having just as much faith in the red-head’s courage and integrity, so he too did not believe she would let down her supporters by running away. ‘The trouble is, what they did and how to prove it.’
‘There’s some’s’d say that should be asked,’ Matilda Boomer said, with the air of one stating the obvious.
“Grove” Rymer dropped by the Ring, as if he was just looking in while making his rounds,’ Cole answered. ‘Gates told him without being asked, that he’d sent Booth’s five amigos out of town so they wouldn’t try to get evens with Calam. “Grove” didn’t push it, nor let on we know she’s gone missing.’
‘Did Gates say where they’d gone?’ Agnes wanted to know.
‘Out to Velma Tickman’s chicken ranch,’ the marshal replied. ‘Wherever that might be.’
‘It’s about five miles west of town,’ Agnes informed them, showing neither embarrassment nor disapproval as she gave the location of a well-known local brothel. ‘But I know Velma and she wouldn’t stand for anything like that. Having Calam taken and held there, I mean.’
‘Which’s what “Grove” told me,’ Cole admitted.
‘Do you think they’re holding her at the saloon?’ the brunette asked pensively.
‘I wouldn’t reckon so,’ Cole replied. ‘They’d not be willing to take such a chance in case we insisted on searching it.’
‘Maybe you and me ought to go down there and make sure, Massa Cole,’ Matilda suggested, her long association with Agnes having allowed her to be present during the conversation. ‘I reckon ’tween us we could do it, one way or another.’
‘Not quickly enough,’ the brunette pointed out, glancing at the clock on the mantelpiece. ‘It’s half after eight already. Dam it, Solly, I wish I’d called you sooner.’
‘You didn’t miss her until half after seven,’ the marshal consoled. ‘And it took Mattie a while to find me. No, it’s my fault. I should’ve watched her instead of Wally Siddons.’
‘You thought you were taking the right precaution in doing so,’ Agnes stated.
While that was true enough, Cole found little comfort in the thought.
The marshal had suspected the Gateses might be unwilling to rely solely upon Binnie’s ability with so much at stake. However, he had been completely wrong in his assumption over how the precautionary measures would be taken. That Calamity might be prevented from competing had occurred to him, but he had discounted the idea. There was so much interest in the contest that its postponement would create resentment and hostility which might not be restricted to the girl and her supporters.
On the other hand, Cole had considered the saloonkeeper and his wife might regard Wallace Siddons as better suited to their purpose despite—or perhaps because of—their insistence on having him act as referee. If he could be compelled by some means to conduct the affair with less than his usual scrupulous fairness, their ends could be achieved in a way which would prevent suspicion falling upon them.
Having drawn the conclusion, Cole had acted upon it in the only way possible. As Rymer was unable to supply assistance, needing every deputy to help control the town which was in a restless and excited mood as a result of the impending contest, he had been compelled reluctantly to keep only one of the possibilities under observation.
Events had proved the wrong person was selected!
‘I still reckon me ’n’ you should go down there, Massa Cole,’ Matilda insisted, folding a large black fist and shaking it in a gesture of grim determination. ‘We—!’
‘Even if there was time, the end result might make things worse instead of better,’ Agnes warned. ‘The Gateses and Kretzmer would claim you’re trying to shield Calamity, who’s turned yellow and is either hiding, or has run away.’
‘Don’t say we’s just going to sit on our butts ’n’ let ’em get away with it?’ the maid almost yelped, but was prevented from continuing by a knock on the door.
‘I’ve got the hosses, Cole,’ Marshal Grover Rymer announced, on being admitted by the indignant black woman.
‘Bueno,’ the solemn-faced man replied, then gave his hostess and her maid an apologetic smile. ‘We figured that Gates would try to head us in the wrong direction from where they’ve got Calam hid out. So, remembering there’s an empty cabin down along Crow Creek a ways and having noticed Mrs. Gate’s buckboard’s not where it’s usually kept, we reckoned’s how we’d drift along there to see what’s doing.’
‘Do you think she’s still alive?’ Agnes asked.
‘Yes,’ Cole replied. ‘With the friends she’s got, they wouldn’t want her turning up dead.’ His voice hardened and, at that moment, nobody would have taken him for a member of the cloth even one who practiced the church militant, as he continued, ‘But, by God, if I’m wrong, Gates and Kretzmer won’t live to see the election tomorrow.’
‘There goes a man I’d hate to have riled at me,’ Matilda declared, after the two peace officers had taken their departure. ‘But, much’s I hates them Gateses and Kretzmer, I surely hope he find that Calam girl alive. ’Cause, happen he don’t, he’s going to have to share ’em with me!’
‘They can’t get to the cabin and back in time, though,’ the brunette pointed out and stood up. ‘So something will have to be done until they arrive. Go and get out my gear, Mattie.’
‘You means your—?’ the maid began.
‘That’s just what I mean!’ Agnes confirmed and her face was set in determined lines.
‘Where the hell’s that son-of-a-bitch Chris got to?’ Mike Leigh grumbled, so filled with impatience and a sense of grievance he forgot the instructions received with regards to avoiding the use of names. ‘If he’s stopped to watch the fight Bonnie’s going to put on so’s the fellers won’t be too riled with her for that whore not showing, I’ll fix his wagon good.’
‘He’s had plenty of time to get here,’ Royston Hattersley mumbled, his speech somewhat impaired by a badly swollen jaw, studying the watch he had taken out and which had survived without damage his misfortunes earlier in the day. ‘It’s coming up to a quarter for nine.’
There was cause for the comments. Ignoring the orders given by Warren Gates once he and his companions had delivered Calamity Jane to the cabin about five miles south of Cheyenne along Crow Creek, Chris Hitchens had set out for the town. While they had brought their bedrolls and sufficient other supplies to let them spend the night at the cabin without too much discomfort, liquor had not been included. So he had said he would fetch some, obtaining it at another saloon. A similar idea had occurred to the others, but he had taken his departure before any of them could try to assert a better right to do so.
‘We ’n’s could be having fun if he is,’ Len Murray complained. Looking across the room to the cause of their present discontent, he went on, ‘Which we can still have some with her, only not the same kind.’
‘You know Warren said we was to keep our hands offen her,’ David Ennals reminded, rubbing his injured wrist, which throbbed painfully despite being in splints and bandaged.
‘He’s not here!’ Murray countered, glancing at the other two and trying to estimate whether he could count upon their support. ‘And what can he do when he finds out it’s already been done?’
‘You want to find out, go ahead!’ Ennals replied. ‘But, knowing what he’s like when he’s “riz”—and who he’s got behind him—I’m not figuring to.’
‘I’ll tell you something else,’ Leigh supplemented. ‘Happen you go again’ him, stay far clear of Cheyenne.’
‘There’s other god-damned towns!’ Murray pointed out sullenly, possessing a nature which rejected advice no matter how sound it might be. ‘And I’m fed so my guts’re full with taking rawhiding from him ’n’ her. So I don’t concluded how missing meeting ’em again’ll make me sleep any the worst once I’ve had my pleasure.’
Listening to the conversation without being able to see the men who were making it, as she sat on the floor where she had been dumped unceremoniously on arrival, Calamity awaited the answer to the comment in a state of trepidation. She was still swathed in the sacks which had been draped around her from each end after she had been stunned at the livery barn and the gag was still in position. Nor, after a few tentative tugs had disclosed she could not free herself from the bonds encircling her coverings, had she wasted time in struggling futilely. They were less tightly fastened than they could be and she had not wished to have the situation rectified to her further disadvantage. Accepting that escape would be unlikely to succeed while they were watching her, she had remained passive and was awaiting a suitable opportunity to take action. Forcing herself to remain motionless, she was nevertheless prepared to defend herself in any way possible should the speaker—who, like his companions, she had identified by the names each had inadvertently used—obtain support for his proposal, or start to put it into effect alone should they turn him down.
Before either situation could eventuate, something happened to take the men’s attention from the subject they were discussing. The creaking of the front door’s hinges drew their eyes in that direction. What they saw in the light of the two lamps they had brought and which were suspended from hooks in the ceiling diverted their thoughts away from the captive red-head.
A very shapely and obviously female leg clad in a black stocking, which added to its attraction, was extended through the partially open entrance to the building. Although the rest of the body to which it belonged remained tantalizingly out of sight, a feminine voice with a seductively Southern drawl said, ‘Howdy, you-all in there. Miz Binnie’s sent Millie-Sue and lil ole me out with some goodies for you. Who-all’s going to help us tote them in? First one here gets to see how smooth these stockings of mine are afore you start.’
There was no hesitation, or debate, over the response to this proposal.
Even Murray, who had been experiencing serious misgivings in view of his companions’ reaction to the suggestion that they rape the red-head, joined the unanimous rush to make the most of the invitation.
The leg was withdrawn as, with Murray slightly in the lead, the four eager young men were approaching their goal. Even as he was reaching to open the door, there was a thud such as would have been made by somebody kicking the planks. Which, as the way it flew open proved, had happened. A howl of agony burst from Murray as it struck his outstretched hand, breaking two of his fingers. While he staggered backwards, his companions changed their advances into even more hurried retreats and began to grab for their revolvers.
Neither of the leading pair of figures to spring across the threshold was the cause of the mass rush to the door. They were, in fact, the pair of Indian-featured men in cow-hand’s attire who had hurled Leigh along the sidewalk outside Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon to collide with Hitchens and Hattersley. Furthermore, as each had a Winchester Model of 1873 carbine in his hands, they seemed even more menacing upon this occasion.
Following closely upon the newcomers’ heels, carrying what appeared to be a light caliber Colt revolver in her right hand,100 was the young woman they had saved from Leigh’s wrath; although he might have been excused if he had not recognized her. Gone were the spectacles and primly-proper garments, the latter being replaced by attire which was far more creditable to her. While her hair was the same, her beautiful features had lost the obviously false nose which reduced their charm and were set in an expression implying grim and deadly earnest intentions. The man’s dark blue shirt and Levi’s pants she had on, one leg still being rolled up from allowing the limb to be exposed as bait—she had removed and was carrying its Indian moccasin in her left hand—proved she had contours just as full and curvaceous as those of Calamity.
Swinging the butt of his carbine around vigorously, the taller of the masculine intruders drove its butt against the side of Leigh’s jaw and, to the accompaniment of a crack of breaking bone, sent him spinning across the cabin to crash unconscious on the floor. Having retreated farther, Hattersley was out of the second man’s range where such an attack was concerned. This did not save him. As his revolver was coming from its holster, the Winchester which could not have reached him for a blow barked and sent a bullet into his head. Encumbered by the broken wrist, although he had commenced his draw instinctively, Ennals snatched his hand away from its weapon and howled for the pair not to shoot him. Frightened to such an extent that he forgot the pain from his injured fingers, Murray joined in with a yell that he too surrendered.
Leaving her companions to cover the cowed and terrified pair, the beautiful young woman hurried across the cabin. Tucking the revolver into her waistband and donning the moccasin, she knelt alongside and began to unfasten the ropes around the prisoner’s coverings. Despite the assurance she had been given when obtaining the information which allowed the rescue to be effected, she showed relief as the removal of the upper sack revealed Calamity gagged, blinking in the light of the lanterns, but otherwise clearly unharmed.
‘This’s twice in one day I’ve had to pull your hot chestnuts out of the fire, Martha Jane Canary,’ the female rescuer announced, in what might have been chiding tones, removing the gag. ‘Why, land-sakes a-mercy, girl, it’s becoming a habit!’
‘B … B … Belle Starr!’ the red-head gasped, once her mouth was liberated, staring as if hardly able to believe the evidence of her eyes. The other girl had withdrawn into the crowd, accompanied by the two men, avoiding being brought into the discussion which followed the affray and had therefore gone unnoticed by the red-head. ‘By cracky, Belle-gal, I don’t know when I was more pleased to see you.’
‘I should think so too, for shame,’ the rescuer replied, making no attempt to deny she was the notorious lady outlaw, Belle Starr, as this was indeed the case. Continuing the work of liberation, she went on, Tm sorry we couldn’t get here sooner, Calam, but that ham-headed yack we caught sneaking out of town fainted when Blue-Duck and Sammy started to ask him where they’d got you and it took longer than I expected to find out.’
‘I don’t know’s I blame him for that,’ the red-head declared, throwing a grateful glance at the two men and knowing they possessed the effectiveness of their Indian forbears when it came to eliciting information from reluctant donors. ‘Only I wish you could’ve got here a mite sooner. I surely hate to keep a lady waiting, even when she’s no son-of-a-bitching lady. Anyway, they do say anything worth doing’s worth waiting for and I’m figuring it’s going to be worth doing what I’m going to do to her.’
Unlike U.S. Marshal Solly Cole, Calamity was unaware of the possible repercussions which her failure to appear on time was threatening to bring about at that moment.
‘Where’s your girl, Mayor Drysdale?’ Binnie Gates called, having signaled for and brought silence to the packed-to-capacity barroom. She leaned over the top rope of the boxing ring which was erected in its center. ‘Don’t tell me she’s ate crow and run away?’
As always was the case when participating in a boxing bout, the blonde had entered the ring with her hair taken into a bun at the back of her head and with her face as heavily made up as if attending to more conventional business in the saloon. Her bulky figure was encased rather than clad in a very tight fitting sleeveless white satin bodice, which was all too clearly her torso’s sole covering, and she wore black tights and flat soled, calf high ring boots. Her whole demeanor was redolent of triumph and satisfaction as she asked the question to which she already was aware of the answer.
Before the dearly perturbed civic official could reply, an excited rumble of comment arose and the crowd between the saloon’s main entrance and the ring began to part so two new arrivals could pass through. One was the big black maid, Matilda Boomer, carrying a towel, bucket and a square wooden box. It was, however, the other who had produced the eagerness to allow them to go by. While this one also gave the impression of being feminine, the hood of a long black cloak entirely concealed her features and gave little indication via her build as to her identity, other than glimpses of footwear beneath its floor-trailing hem, similar to that worn by Binnie. Studying her, as she and the maid climbed the three wooden steps and ducked beneath the ropes to enter the ring, Binnie was as puzzled as the spectators. However, even if she had known it could not be Calamity Jane, she could have deduced the person who clearly intended to replace the red-head was slightly shorter and bulkier. Nearer to her own size, in fact.
Neither the blonde nor the almost entirely masculine crowd filling the room were kept long in doubt over the second newcomer’s identity.
‘As you may know, Mrs. Gates,’ Agnes Hickok announced, with just as carrying tones which reached everybody else present in the silence which followed her tossing back the hood and starting to open the cloak, disclosing that her brunette hair was also secured in a bun. ‘Calamity Jane is—indisposed—So, rather than allow everybody here to be disappointed …’ She turned her gaze to the tall, well built, middle-aged man clad in a black turtleneck sweater, slacks and ring boots starting to come forward from the third corner and went on, ‘ … With Mr. Siddons’ permission, I am offering myself as a substitute.’
‘Under the same rules and conditions?’ Binnie asked eagerly, when the excited chatter aroused by the proposal died away and before the referee could speak.
‘Exactly the same,’ Agnes confirmed. ‘May I substitute, Mr. Siddons?’
‘Well!’ the referee began, not sure what to make of the unexpected development, although he was aware of Calamity’s disappearance. ‘I …I … What would Wild Bill say?’
‘That I’m acting to his complete satisfaction,’ the brunette stated. ‘And I’ll absolve you of all responsibility for anything that may happen to me.’
‘All right!’ Siddons assented, albeit reluctantly, but taking a warning from the crowd’s shouted demands for the offer to be accepted. He was aware of the issues involved outside the actual bout and believed Agnes was bravely, if perhaps foolhardily, trying to rectify the situation by ensuring the spectators were given some consolation for the red-head’s absence. Silently promising himself he would end it the moment she showed signs of being in danger of injury, regardless of public opinion, he went on, ‘You can substitute for Calamity Jane.’
A hiss of satisfaction broke from Binnie, being drowned by the tumultuous applause greeting the referee’s decision. From the day of her arrival in Cheyenne when what was intended as a grand opening of the Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon, had failed and lost customers due to a function planned much earlier by Agnes, she had developed a growing antipathy where the brunette—who she knew had been some kind of performer in a circus prior to marrying Wild Bill Hickok—was concerned. The dislike had become mutual when each had found herself on the opposing sides in the competition to attain office as the city’s mayor. However, never in her wildest dreams had she hoped to be given such an opportunity to work off her animosity.
Watching the brunette remove the cloak revealing that she was dressed in an almost identical fashion to herself, even to the extent of wearing nothing beneath the bodice, the blonde gave thought as to how she might be able to extract the fullest vengeance. She drew similar conclusions to those of Siddons, including on how he would behave once the battering she wanted to inflict was commenced. So she was determined to subject her hated rival to the utmost humiliation and, if the means she employed caused a withdrawal from the bout, it would serve her husband and Hubert Kretzmer’s purpose as effectively as if the substitution had not been proposed.
‘All right, Hickok!’ Binnie shouted, drawing off the bodice and tossing it to one of the saloongirls who were to act as her seconds. Standing with arms akimbo, feet apart and thrusting forward the naked mounds of a bosom that was firm in spite of its size, she continued, ‘Let’s have it out this way and show the boys here who’s the better woman!’
Once again the audience began to make its sentiments known in no uncertain manner. While Drysdale and some of the men who formed his party at a ringside table adjacent to Agnes’ corner rose and objected, it was obvious that the majority of those present were in wholehearted agreement with Binnie’s suggestion.
Another dissident, strange as it might have struck some people, was Kretzmer. He began a hurried, if sotto voce, protest to Warren Gates, with whom he and Albert Booth were sharing a table at the opposite side of the ring to the mayor. However, his objections were less humanitarian and laudable than those from Drysdale’s party.
While Kretzmer was aware that Binnie had boxed bare to the waist on other occasions, they had always been private bouts before carefully selected and well-paying audiences. Such a public flaunting of conventions might offend people’s susceptibilities and lose badly needed support for his cause. Yet, for all his misgivings, listening to the delighted response from the majority of the spectators he was warned that he would be ill-advised to state his objections openly. A glance informed him that Gates neither shared his concern, nor appeared other than delighted by the brazen behavior to which many husbands would have taken exception.
For her part, Agnes was giving just as much consideration to the ramifications of the latest development. She was aware of the blonde’s motives and realized she might turn one aspect of them to her advantage. There were, however, other points to be taken into account before reaching a decision.
Although Cheyenne was the capital city of Wyoming, wanting to avoid showing open partisanship with either of the factions contesting the election for mayor, the Governor and every other leading member of the Legislature had found reasons to be elsewhere until after it was over. So nobody who was in sufficiently high office to help further the plans Agnes and her husband had for the future were present to be influenced adversely by whatever decision she reached. What was more, having a similar desire to avoid letting it be thought he was using his reputation as a gun fighter to further Drysdale’s candidature, Wild Bill had gone on a visit to the gold camp known as Deadwood accompanied by his friend, ‘Colorado’ Charlie Utter.101 Knowing him, however, she was certain he would approve of what she meant to do when he was informed of her actions.
‘Very well,’ the brunette said, after a pause and speaking in tones redolent of reluctance, as she hesitantly began to peel off the form-hugging blue silk bodice. Making a not entirely successful effort to keep a bosom just as well developed and imposing as that of the blonde concealed with her hands instead of flaunting it, she finished, ‘If that’s how you want it, there’s nothing I can do but agree,’
‘Round one!’ called the timekeeper, jerking at the lanyard of the bell on his table.
Advancing from her corner in the fashion of a competent male boxer, Binnie Gates was delighted by the evidence that she had been correct in her assumption of one benefit to be gained from her suggestion of fighting bare to the waist. It came from watching how Agnes Hickok advanced in a crouching posture and with her . hands covering the breasts. By doing so, she was leaving her face entirely unprotected. The blonde promised herself she would make the most of the opportunity being presented and that Wild Bill was not going to find his wife’s face anywhere near so pretty when he came home.
Although Wallace Siddons had tried to oppose the women fighting in such a manner, his wishes were over-ruled by the determination of the spectators to witness so novel a spectacle. Nor had his second objections met with any greater success. When the gloves were produced, they had not been the large and well-padded kind used in the ‘exhibition’ bouts which frequently formed the entertainment offered by Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon. Instead, they were the four ounce variety employed only by male pugilists on rare occasions such as genuine grudge fights. Once again, claiming that wearing them would really prove who was the better woman, the blonde had had the majority of the crowd’s wholehearted support.
In spite of his reluctant concurrence, the referee had felt a growing perturbation as he watched how Agnes was behaving during the preliminaries. From the moment she had removed the bodice, she appeared to be embarrassed by her temerity and sought to shield her naked bosom from the licentious gaze of the spectators. Nor had she seemed any less ill at ease when, after having been subjected to a careful examination by Siddons, Matilda had laced on her gloves and, the introductions carried out, she left her corner on the signal to commence being given.
Grinning in anticipation and supremely confident in the eventual outcome, Binnie shot her left fist in a jab towards the exposed face. It failed to connect. Leaving their position of shielding at least some of her two sizeable mounds of bust, the brunette’s right hand deftly knocked up the approaching arm and, showing an equal precision, the left was driven into the identical target on her opponent. As Binnie’s head was jolted back, a trickle of blood oozing from her pain-filled nose, Agnes followed up the attack with a right uppercut that dumped her unceremoniously in a sitting position on the floor of the ring.
Shaking her head to clear it, the blonde rubbed her left arm across her face and stared at the red smear it acquired. Then, with the laughter of the spectators and the sound of the referee counting ringing in her ears, she glared up at the brunette. Fury boiled through her as she forced herself upright and rushed forward impetuously, which proved as disastrous as her previous effort. The blow she launched was much wilder than she generally employed, if more powerful, but also failed to connect. Side-stepping in a way that would not have disgraced a good male boxer, Agnes hooked her in the stomach as she blundered by. As she in haled sharply, another blow caught her on the ear and sent her staggering to be saved from falling by colliding against the ropes.
‘You “something-sucking, something”!’ Binnie spat out, as she turned and saw her opponent coming forward in the stance of a trained boxer and showing no signs of her earlier apparent concern over allowing her bosom to be visible. ‘You’ve been in a ring before!’
‘In the same place I learned to shoot,’ Agnes confirmed. ‘The circus. And, before I’m through, you’re going to be begging to tell me where you’ve put Calamity Jane!’
‘Try and make me!’ the blonde challenged, goaded to the point that—in spite of realizing she might be playing into her opponent’s hands—she charged away from the ropes with fists flailing.
And, for the third time, Binnie achieved only further punishment for herself!
With her gloves meeting only the empty space vacated an instant earlier by the brunette, another punch took the blonde in her mid-section. Despite the hard muscles beneath a noticeable layer of fat, the blow hurt. So did the uppercut to her chin as she was driven into an involuntary retreat and the right cross to the head which sent her, senses spinning, sprawling to suck the pungent aroma of resin from the canvas through her throbbing and blood emitting nose. Suffering more from the combination of pain and humiliation of her treatment than had ever previously been the case, she forced herself to rise as the referee’s count reached seven.
For all a combination of warnings given by her mind and comments from her husband, Binnie could not prevent herself from continuing to pursue similar rash and pain-creating tactics. She was repulsed just as capably as had been the way previously in the bout. Bombarded by a veritable battery of punches, her own gloves did nothing more than miss their sought-for targets. Yet she might have counted herself fortunate in one respect. As she was to discover in the near future, relieved of the necessity of employing evasive tactics to avoid reciprocal punishment, the brunette was capable of inflicting far more telling punishment than had been delivered so far.
‘What the hell’s wrong with you?’ Warren Gates demanded angrily, after his wife had been literally dragged to her corner by her seconds—still struggling to go on despite the signal to cease hostilities—when the bell signaled the end of the round. ‘You’ve not so much as laid a glove on her and she’s making you look like a “something” idiot.’
‘I’ll get her in the next round!’ Binnie promised and, before submitting herself to the ministrations of her seconds, elaborated. ‘I’ll pound her tits flat, see if I don’t!’
‘You’ve got her on the run, Miz Agnes!’ Matilda Boomer enthused, fanning her employer with a towel.
‘I’ve been lucky so far,’ the brunette answered, studying her opponent with experienced eyes. ‘She’s far from finished yet and she knows she doesn’t have a patsy on her hands now. So she’ll be more careful.’
The clang of the bell to start the second round demonstrated how accurately Agnes Hickok had assessed the situation.
Showing none of the over confidence which had caused her so much misfortune and suffering in the first round, Binnie Gates still bore in determinedly rather than sparring for an opening as she and the brunette came together. What was more, although Agnes had refrained from taking opportunities to do so presented by her earlier incautious behavior, she aimed deliberate punches into the breasts as often as chances were presented. After receiving the fourth to that extremely sensitive region of the feminine anatomy, however, the brunette started to respond in kind and she was equally effective.
The round passed to the accompaniment of great applause and encouragement from the onlookers, all of whom had lost their disappointment over Calamity Jane having failed to put in the promised appearance, but without either woman gaining any noticeable ascendancy. Nor did the pace of the action slacken during the third round. Hard blows were delivered and received, the tendency on each contender’s part being to concentrate on attack rather than defensive tactics. It was increasingly obvious, however, that each was determined to win and Agnes was fully as competent as Binnie to indulge in whatever means were employed in an attempt to ensure victory.
During the second minute, the blonde contrived to come out of a clinch with the brunette’s head held under her left arm. Before Siddons could extract her from the illegal position, Agnes was subjected to half a dozen hard punches to her face. Staggering away on being released, she took advantage of the referee expostulating with Binnie to retaliate in kind. Moving in, she caught the blonde in the same manner and, counting each loudly as it was landed, rained six equally hard blows on the defenseless features. Then, on releasing her grip, she backed away and did not offer to resume the attack until Binnie was recovered sufficiently to fight back.
Two further rounds went by, hard fought and grueling, but without either woman gaining more than a brief ascendancy over the other at any time. Certainly the spectators had no reason to complain as they were being treated to a bout of sustained fury and determination to win far in excess of anything they had seen previously. One thing became increasingly apparent as the bout progressed. Despite having given no indication of possessing such knowledge since her arrival in Cheyenne, Agnes was a very skillful boxer. Furthermore, she proved herself well able to cope with the dirty fighting tricks employed by her far from scrupulous opponent.
Early in the fourth round, after landing a blow to the breast which inflicted sufficient pain to allow her to dominate the action and return some of the punishment she had received in the first, the blonde took advantage of the clinch Agnes went into in an attempt to hold off her onslaught. Bringing up her left hand, she jabbed its thumb into the brunette’s right eye and, being at the other side, the referee could not see her. Almost immediately, she was subjected to similar treatment and swung around so Siddons could see what she, but not her opponent, was doing. On being ordered to break, each swung a blow which caused them to stagger some distance apart as they obeyed. They returned to the fray almost immediately, but the ascendancy Binnie had acquired was gone.
Knocking the brunette down in the middle of the fifth, not for the first time since the bout commenced, the blonde pretended to stumble and dropped knees first on to her. Although Siddons suspected this was anything except an accident, he could not prove it and had no option but to let the fight go on. The round went to Binnie and Agnes looked very relieved when the timekeeper signified it was at an end. She was sent to the canvas again early in the sixth, landing supine. Deciding to improve upon the effects of the previous ‘accident’, the blonde faked another slip, falling sideways with the intention of landing full length on her victim. An instant before the contact was made, however, the brunette rolled clear and she hit the floor with a bone jarring thud instead of descending on the comparatively soft and yielding body she had expected to break her fall. She beat the count, but only just and spent the rest of the round suffering for her trickery to such an extent she had to be helped back to her corner by the seconds when the bell sounded.
Watching the two women working desperately on his wife, Warren Gates felt a sense of apprehension which was not caused through sympathy with her bruised, bloody and battered condition. Experienced in such matters, he realized that only a miracle could save her. A study of the almost as badly marked and exhausted brunette as her very skilled maid worked to revive her warned him that one was unlikely to be forthcoming.
‘Wait until they start again,’ the saloonkeeper said sotto voce, but with such intensity that the two men at his table gave him their immediate attention. ‘Then we’re getting the hell out of here.’
‘Why?’ Hubert Kretzmer demanded, having found the sight of the two women fighting bare to the waist a most stimulating experience despite his earlier misgivings.
‘Because if Binnie gets licked—and I reckon she’s going to real soon,’ Gates replied, ‘I don’t have nowhere near enough money to pay out on all the bets I took,’
‘But I’m not involved in that!’ Kretzmer protested, his voice registering alarm.
‘Do what you want,’ Gates answered coldly. ‘But me, I’m getting the hell out of it. I know what they do to folks who welch on bets and it’s not going to happen to me.’
‘I’m with you, Warrie!’ Booth asserted.
At that moment, the bell sounded and, watching his companions leave their seats as the two women went to the center of the ring, Kretzmer rose to follow them. Looking back, before the men who had parted to let them through closed in again, Gates cursed himself for having delayed so long. He decided his only hope was that everybody would be so excited at the end of the fight that his absence would not be noticed in time to have measures taken which would prevent him from fleeing as he wanted to do.
Even if Binnie had been aware of her husband’s desertion and wanted to help him, she could not have served his purpose better. Sheer guts kept her going, aided by Agnes’s greatly weakened condition, for longer than he had anticipated. Stumbling on legs which had lost their earlier bounce and propulsive power, she contrived to keep on her feet in spite of being reduced to the state known as ‘following’; whereby her hands repeatedly went to the point at which she had been hit, instead of trying to anticipate and block the blow before it reached her.
Nor, in spite of her desperate desire to terminate the fight and gain relief from her own suffering, was the brunette able to do so for over two minutes. In fact, as the seconds dragged by on leaden feet, she found herself sobbing for breath and almost collapsing from the waves of exhaustion threatening to engulf her. At last, when she felt she could do no more, the memory of why she was engaged in the grueling fight came to her again. As on the other occasions when she was in dire straits, the thought of what might be happening to Calamity Jane gave her the stimulus she so badly needed. Gathering every last dreg of strength and energy she possessed, she pushed the tottering blonde away from the mauling clinch they were in. Having done so, she threw a punch that had everything she could manage by way of stamina behind it. Her thinly gloved left fist buried itself into the already swollen and bruised left breast. It proved the last straw for the recipient. Giving a croaking gasp, Binnie toppled backwards. For a moment after she landed supine, her body writhed and twitched, then she became still.
Oblivious of the thunderous applause and roars of ‘Good for you, Mrs. Wild Bill!’ which were ringing out on all sides of the ring, Agnes stumbled to and fell against the ropes. It was their support alone which kept her on her feet while Siddons was carrying out the pure formality of making the count and she collapsed as she was being proclaimed the winner.
‘Going some place, gents?’ inquired a sardonic voice identified as that of Marshal Grover Rymer by the three men who were leaving by the rear entrance of Battling Binnie’s Ring Saloon.
Swinging their gaze in the direction from which the words had come, Warren Gates, Hubert Kretzmer and Albert Booth found to their consternation that the local peace officer was not alone It was not the fact that one of the people with him was the solemn faced man they knew only as ‘Solomon Wisdom’ which created the alarm they experienced. Even discounting the reason why they were quitting the building, carrying all the money from its safe, the sight of Calamity Jane warned them that they were in a very precarious position.
‘Get them!’ Gates roared, letting fall the bulky saddlebags he was carrying and, instead of reaching for his bolstered revolver, he started to raise the walking cane grasped in his right hand, the left going across to take hold of it too.
Knowing the purpose behind the saloonkeeper’s apparently pointless action, Booth started to grab for his weapon. However, in spite of having a revolver in a shoulder holster, Kretzmer made no attempt to duplicate the young man’s behavior. Instead, spinning on his heel, he started to flee as fast as his legs would carry him.
Sharing Booth’s knowledge that the stick concealed a firearm, its owner’s way of handling it precluding the possibility of the weapon being a sword, U.S. Marshal Solly Cole had no hesitation over the manner in which he responded. Dipping his right hand, he demonstrated that his unusual mode of carrying the Roger & Spencer put him at no disadvantage when there was a need to extract it rapidly. Shoving it forward, through the open front of the holster, he thumbed back the hammer while tilting the barrel into alignment and fired all in one single blur of motion.
Swiftly fired though it might have been, the .44 bullet from Cole’s gun tore into Gates’ head. Jerked backwards by the impact, he pressed the trigger and caused his disguised weapon to be discharged harmlessly into the air. He was dead before his reeling body collided with and bounced from the wall of the saloon.
Slower than Cole, Rymer still proved adequate for the occasion. His revolver was out and barked, sending its lead into Booth’s chest before the young man was able to complete the draw and throw down on him.
Nor was Kretzmer any more successful in his bid to escape. Liberating her whip, which she had retrieved along with her property from her abductors at the cabin, Calamity sent out its long lash to snare his right leg and bring him crashing to the ground. Transferring the handle to her left hand, she twisted free the Navy Colt with the right and strolled forward.
‘Stay put, feller!’ the girl commanded, cocking and lining the weapon. ‘I didn’t like the look of you from the start. You put me in mind of a city slicker’s sold me a watch one time. The son-of-a-bitching thing stopped running afore he did.’
‘Kretzmer’s confirmed all Miss S—your amigo told us, Calam,’ Solly Cole informed the red-head, as they sat at the table in the dining-room of the owners’ quarters of the Hickoks’ hotel. The time was half past one in the afternoon on the day after the hectic events which had brought them together. ‘He was being backed by that Eastern bunch who’re trying to take hold of towns out West.’
Arriving after Calamity Jane’s rescue had been effected by Belle Starr and her two companions, the peace officers had been informed of Warren Gates’s reasons for supporting Hubert Kretzmer’s candidature for mayor. Leaving Belle and her men to take care of the survivors of the abduction, without offering to ask what had brought her to the vicinity, they had escorted the red-head back to town. Approaching the rear of the saloon with the intention of entering by the back door and arresting its owner for complicity in the kidnapping, they had heard the tumult arising from the end of the fight and were in time to prevent the trio from escaping.
‘Something tells me he won’t be getting elected,’ Calamity commented with a grin, but it faded as their hostess hobbled slowly into the room, with every indication that each movement was causing pain. ‘Whooee! That must have been one hell of a fight you and her put up!’
There was good cause for the comment. In addition to the way Agnes Hickok was walking, her left eye was reduced to a discolored slit, her nose badly swollen and top lip puffed to twice its size.
‘It’s not a thing I’d want to go through again,’ the brunette admitted, lowering herself gingerly into the chair Cole drew out for her. After she had heard the story of their adventures, she asked, ‘What’s going to happen to Mrs. Gates? From what Mattie was telling me, she’ll have to sell the saloon to pay off the bets her husband took and, on top of everything else, I think that’s punishment enough.’
‘It’s not my place to do anything about her,’ Cole answered. ‘And “Grove” Rymer’s of the same mind as you-all. He says, so long’s she pays off and gets out of Cheyenne, he’s satisfied with letting her go.’
‘I’m pleased to hear it,’ Agnes said sincerely. ‘Much as I’ve always disliked her, I’ve got to admit she’s a dead game fighter.’
‘And I know one even gamer,’ Calamity Jane declared, looking with open admiration at the brunette and remembering how she had been so confident of attaining victory over the woman who had inflicted the injuries. ‘By cracky, I reckon I’ll not be sorry to be moving on myself afore somebody wants me to lock horns with you, Mrs. Wild Bill.’