Demented

A rotund little Frenchman, perspiring, slovenly, excited as a baker chasing stolen buns, rushed, dithering and gesticulating about the prize ring in the Polo Grounds, Manhat- tan. In frothing, broken accents he screamed at the referee, judges and journalists, crowded about below him, that foul play was at hand. For proof, he pointed to a sagging figure who staggered weakly over the boards, doubled up with pain. He grabbed at the staggerer's blue silk shorts, tried to rip them off and expose dire injury. This demented man was null Descamps, Manager of Georges Carpentier, French light heavyweight, arguing in his French way that the "Gorgeous Orchid Man," now a wilted frond, had been crushed by Gene Tunney with a blow below the belt in the 14th (penultimate) round of their fight for Tunney's U. S. light heavyweight boxing title. Policemen subdued Descamps. Referee Griffin seized Tunney's right hand, held it aloft, said: "You win, Gene!" The scene had taken place on a brilliantly illuminated platform in the centre of a gloom-filled amphitheatre. At Griffin's gesture, pandemonium burst from the darkness on all sides. Some 40,000 throats concatenated anger and approval but none save the fighters knew certainly whether a foul blow had been struck. A majority of sport experts, craning from the ringside, exonerated Tunney, credited him with a technical knockout. The public, too, exonerated Tunney, persuaded by his conduct throughout the fight that he was incapable of low action. From the moment Carpentier first sprang at him, with back arched, on cat-like toes, Tunney fought like a gentleman. And the public was grieved that so gallant a fighter as Carpentier should come under suspicion of "playing up" his injury to win applause and sympathy. For nine rounds, the handsome, blond ring-idol of Europe had assaulted a dangerous foe, taken hard battering. In the tenth round, he had grovelled horribly on the floor, all but unconscious, then had arisen and torn into Tunney with dizzy, desperate courage, thunderously cheered by the crowd. Stretched limp in his dressing room afterwards, Carpentier assured questioners that he had been struck foully. Descamps echoed his charge, only adding that he felt sure the thrust had been accidental. Asked if he would now retire from the ring, having been beaten by Dempsey, Gibbons and Tunney, said Georges: "Never! Not now. I want to avenge myself on Tunney!"