Instantly, by the sure sense which is half sight, half feeling--the sense that guides the expert fencer's hand and wrist--Beverley knew that he had probably more than his match, and in ten seconds his attack was met by a time thrust in opposition which touched him sharply.
Alice sprang far back, lowered her point and laughed.
"Je vous salue, Monsieur Beverley!" she cried, with childlike show of delight.

"Did you feel the button ?" "Yes, I felt it," he said with frank acknowledgment in his voice, "it was cleverly done.

Now give me a chance to redeem myself." He began more carefully and found that she, too, was on her best mettle; but it was a short bout, as before.

Alice seemed to give him an easy opening and he accepted it with a thrust; then something happened that he did not understand.

The point of his foil was somehow caught under his opponent's hilt-guard while her blade seemed to twist around his; at the same time there was a wring and a jerk, the like of which he had never before felt, and he was disarmed, his wrist and fingers aching with the wrench they had received.
Of course the thing was not new; he had been disarmed before; but her trick of doing it was quite a mystery to him, altogether different from any that he had ever seen.
"Vous me pardonnerez, Monsieur," she mockingly exclaimed, picking up his weapon and offering the hilt to him.