THE MAYOR'S PARTY Beverley was so surprised and confused in his mind by the ease with which he had been mastered at swordplay by a mere girl, that he felt as if just coming out of a dream.

In fact the whole affair seemed unreal, yet so vivid and impressive in all its main features, that he could not emerge from it and look it calmly over from without.

His experience with women had not prepared him for a ready understanding and acceptance of a girl like Alice.

While he was fully aware of her beauty, freshness, vivacity and grace, this Amazonian strength of hers, this boldness of spirit, this curious mixture of frontier crudeness and a certain adumbration--so to call it--of patrician sensibilities and aspirations, affected him both pleasantly and unpleasantly.

He did not sympathize promptly with her semi-barbaric costume; she seemed not gently feminine, as compared with the girls of Virginia and Maryland.
He resented her muscular development and her independent disposition.
She was far from coarseness, however, and, indeed, a trace of subtle refinement, although not conventional, imbued her whole character.
But why was he thinking so critically about her?
Had his selfishness received an incurable shock from the button of her foil?
A healthy young man of the right sort is apt to be jealous of his physical prowess--touch him there and he will turn the world over to right himself in, his own admiration and yours.