The women all eyed each other, some of them blushing and clearing their throats at this turn of events. Tori began to shuffle away from the group when Mrs. Boswell spotted her and grabbed her by the arm. Yanked to the front, Tori grimaced when Mrs. Boswell raised their joined arms in the air and bellowed.
“Ladies, let us march forward for decency.”
The woman dragged Tori along as she charged through the batwing doors and into the saloon. Several scantily dressed young women lounging on sofas jumped up screaming, and ran for the stairs. The bartender, in the process of polishing glasses, dropped his jaw in disbelief as the town’s most respectable ladies decked out in hats, gloves, and signs swarmed in.
“We demand to see the owner!” Mrs. Boswell shouted over the screaming of the girls and the banging of the drum. The Ladies League for Decency continued to sing “Amazing Grace.” Tori attempted to pull away from Mrs. Boswell, but the woman’s grip was ironclad.
Mrs. Boswell approached the immobile bartender, dragging Tori along. “Young man! We demand to see your owner.”
The bartender snapped to attention. “The boss ain’t here.”
“What do you mean, not here? Is he hiding from us? This is outrageous. We won’t be deterred.”
The bartender gulped a few times, his eyes searching the room as if hoping for an escape.
“Ladies,”—Mrs. Boswell turned to face her troops—“We will search the premises and find Mr. Johnson.”
The blood drained from Tori’s face. She would surely faint dead away right this minute. Mrs. Bowell wanted these women, who were the pillars of society, to search a saloon and brothel?
Some of the women, however, must have seen an opportunity to view what decent ladies of society always wondered about. Within minutes, the most daring of them raced into the back room, while others sprinted up the stairs.
Before Mrs. Boswell, still dragging Tori, got more than three steps up the stairs, a group of women in negligees, corsets, and heavy makeup, came down the steps shouting, then pushed the ladies back. Mrs. Boswell took her sign and smacked the oldest-looking woman, with bright yellow hair and black kohl around her eyes, right over the head. The woman shoved Mrs. Boswell backwards and she tumbled, taking Tori with her. Within minutes, women were pushing and shoving and swinging signs at each other.
Someone smacked Tori in the back of the head, causing her spectacles to go flying off her face. In self-defense, she swung out and whacked her sign alongside the head of a hefty black- haired saloon girl. A short redhead in a corset pulled Tori’s hair, jerking her off her feet. Hairpins flew in all directions. Tori got back up, dusted off her backside, and shoved the girl. She fell into two other ladies. The three of them landed on a card table, scattering cards and chips everywhere before it collapsed under their weight. Through all this, Edwin continued to chew his tobacco and bang on his drum. The few men having a quiet afternoon drink had moved their chairs to the wall and enjoyed the spectacle from there with wide smiles, grins, and smirks on their faces.
Tori tripped over a chubby blond whore and Jane, both rolling on the floor, pulling each other’s hair. A green bottle shattered as the blonde hit the pastor’s wife over the head with it. One of the Decency women repeatedly smacked an older dark-haired saloon girl with the blunt heel of her shoe.
A young girl in a red corset and black stockings raced down the stairs waving a gun. She slipped on the bottom step and the gun went off, the bullet hitting the chandelier in the middle of the room. It swayed precariously before collapsing in a heap in the middle of the floor.
“What in the hell is going on in here?”
The sheriff and two of his deputies stood in the doorway of the saloon. The sheriff put his thumb and pinky in his mouth and whistled three or four times, until the women stopped pushing and shoving, and turned toward the door.
“I said, what the hell is going on in here?”
The saloon women and ladies all climbed to their feet, smoothing and shaking out dresses, and attempting to re-arrange hairdos. They peeked awkwardly around the room. The saloon sat in shambles. More than one table was smashed, as well
as numerous chairs. Blood ran down several women’s faces from various scratches and cuts.
Jane Wilton lay passed out on the floor, blood matting her hair, her hat askew, and her skirts tucked around her knees. Two women with torn dresses were kneeling over her waving their handkerchiefs. Mrs. Boswell’s shirtwaist gaped at the shoulder, blood trickled down her face, and she puffed like a locomotive. Tori backed out from her position under a table where she’d retrieved her smashed spectacles.
“I don’t goddamn believe this,” the sheriff said, walking into the room and shaking his head, not even acknowledging his language. The generous belly hanging over his belt quivered as he kicked smashed bottles and decency signs from under his feet. One deputy covered his smile by straightening his mustache, the other one bit his lip, their eyes bright with mirth. The sheriff scowled at the mess.
Red-faced and sputtering, he placed his hands on his hips and shouted, “All right. Everyone down to the jailhouse.”
“Sheriff, you cannot arrest us!” Mrs. Boswell shifted to her full height and attempted to re-arrange her hanging chignon. “We are the pillars of the community.”
“Mrs. Boswell,” the sheriff said, glowering at her, “I can, and I will. Now I’m telling y’all, git yourselves down to the jail! Even you, Barker.” He growled in the old drummer’s direction. “Quit banging on that drum, and wipe the stupid grin off your face, you old fool!”
The deputies, eyes watering from holding in laughter, herded the crowd of women out the door and down the street to the jail. Storeowners and shoppers gawked at the parade of whores and respectable women in various stages of dress and undress. Hats hung off heads, hair tumbled around shoulders. Several women attempted to hold together torn clothes. Most sported the beginnings of black eyes, bruises, and battered faces. They all marched down the street with the sheriff leading the group and two thoroughly entertained deputies bringing up the rear.
Mortified, Tori limped toward the jail. She’d broken one heel of her shoe and her eye hurt like the devil. What would the children say when they found she’d been arrested?
Arrested! Would she have some type of a permanent record? Spend time in the territory prison? She groaned at the thought of Jesse, a highly regarded lawyer, discovering his wife had landed herself in jail because of a bar brawl.
A bar brawl.
Forty or so sorry looking women crowded into the jailhouse. The sheriff divided the group and locked them all into the three cells. He faced the women, shifting his cigar from one side of his mouth to the other. “Ladies, I have no idea what the devil happened back there, but I’ll tell you this. None of y’all ain’t going nowhere till your husbands git here.”