Free Troubled range by John Thomas Edson

eyes.
    Unbuckling her gunbelt, Calamity put it down on the table by Belle's bag. She dipped her shoulder and charged Belle, sending her sprawling. Belle caught the wall and prevented .herself falling, but her hat slid back and she brushed it from her head. By this time Calamity had picked up the pencil which Belle dropped and turned to the poster once more.

    Belle sprang forward and Calamity twisted to face her, sitting on the table and raising her feet ready to thrust the blonde away. Only Belle did not come in range. Shooting out her hands, she grabbed for Calamity's ankles and caught hold of the cuffs of her pants instead. Calamity let out a yell of anger and surprise as Belle threw her weight back and heaved. Although she tried to grab something, Calamity failed to find anything she might grip and prevent herself being dragged from the table. She landed on the floor with a thud, but Belle had not finished. Backing away, Belle dragged Calamity across the floor, the other girl bending her legs and thrusting, trying to force herself free and grabbing at chairs or table legs to avoid being hauled along.
    To the tune of laughter and'shouts of encouragement, Belle dragged Calamity across the floor. There was only one way out for Calamity, although not a way a more modest young woman would have cared to take. Unbuckling her waist-belt, she tried to slide out of her pants. Their tightness held her and she grabbed the leg of the faro table as she passed it. This proved firm enough, and the table heavy enough, to anchor her down. Belle grunted and threw her weight back to try to tear Calamity free. Too late she realised what Calamity had done. The pants started to slide and Calamity gave a heave which freed herself. She left her pants in Belle's hands and lost her moccasins.
    Taken by surprise, Belle staggered back, lost her footing, and sat down hard, still clinging to Calamity's pants. Calamity, still wearing her kepi, made a pretty picture, her shirt tail flapping around her shapely bare legs and giving glimpses of the new white, lace-frilled combination chemise and drawers she had bought that afternoon to prove to Mark Counter that she was a real lady at heart. They were the latest fashion among show people, short legged and daring, and Calamity had the sort of figure to set them off to their best advantage.
    Coming to her feet, Calamity flung herself at Belle, landing on the blonde before she made her feet. Grabbing down. Calamity gripped Belle's skirt and heaved at it with all her strength. Belle gave a yell, tried to twist herself free and in doing so threw the final pressure on the tortured cloth. With

    a ripping sound, the skirt tore from waist almost to hem. Rearing back, her trophy firmly gripped in both hands, Calamity tore the skirt away, rolling Belle right over and leaving her black stocking-clad legs, with frilly red garters, and black drawers as brief and attractive as Calamity's own, exposed by the hem of her blouse.
    Once more Calamity sprang into the attack, her hands closing on Belle's blouse. Belle forced herself up, her own hands gripped Calamity's shirt neck and her eyes met Calamity's.
    "Try it!" Belle hissed. "And I'll peel you raw." For once in her life Calamity Jane backed down from a challenge. Nothing she had seen about the blonde told her Belle would not carry out the threat of stripping Calamity naked, even if it meant losing every stitch of clothing she wore in the process. Modesty did not prevent Calamity from calling Belle's bluff. She knew that if they did start to remove more clothing, the owners of the saloon would stop the fight. A hair-yanking brawl between two women was common enough for the owners to let one go on, it was regarded as being a bit of added entertainment for the customers. But there were limits to how far the owners dare let such a fight
    go.
    So Calamity released her hold of Belle's blouse, for she did not want what promised to be a good fight stopping. Not until she had