Even in defeat, Vio is one of the Palais' crowning glories

Charismatic Italian withno arms or legs delights her fans despite missing a third gold

- Tanya Aldred

Bebe Vio fences like she is buffeted by the storm-but she is the storm. A curling, bending, surging force, looping backwards like a high jumper, tipping forward on the attack, chair clinging to the ground by its wheel grips.

"You see the world in another way when you have the mask on," she once said. "My favourite world is with the mask on." But all worlds are fallible, and in the echoing grandeur of the Grand Palais yesterday afternoon, a dream slipped away.

As she pulled off her mask after losing her women's B foil semi-final against China's Xiao Rong 15-9, her beautiful face was screwed up in distress. There would be no third consecutive Paralympic title to add to the gold medals won at Rio and Tokyo. She slipped back into her prosthetic legs, a volunteer passed her a prosthetic arm, and she walked away, foil prosthetic still attached to her left shoulder.