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SHOWMAN
seconds could have called their man to his corner and claimed the fight won without our having a ghost of a chance to dispute it. But they missed their chance. I wouldn't be surprised if Mitchell had refused to take the fight that way, being sure he could win by following up these tactics. What with the noise and the danger of gun-play, Kelly had forgotten all he ever knew about the rules. He merely chased me and Dempsey out of the ring and motioned the fighters to go on. By that time it was all right— Dempsey's slap had sobered Corbett up, snapped him out of it— and from then on Mitchell's jabberings had no effect. In fact, at the end of the second, Mitchell fouled Corbett by hitting him after the bell rang. He kept on rushing the champion, game as a bantam rooster, but the jig was up and he knew it. In due time Corbett stretched him on the ropes and it was all over. But it had been a near thing and no mistake.
We got the $25,000 purse that Jacksonville had put up and the $5000 side-bet. Mitchell got nothing. Corbett was right when, shortly before he died, he said to me:
"Bill, we were just twenty years before our time." Nobody else got anything, since Kelly had declared all individual bets off, in view of the dubious nature of the proceedings. Still, we'd defended the title successfully and could go back to the business of cleaning up in the theater. The tradition of the matinee-idol was at its height then and here was a champion who
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