or extreme terror.

For one moment Angelot hesitated. Who or what could this be? Some one
was in trouble, some woman, and probably a woman he knew. Or could it be
a child, hurt by some animal? One of the bulls at La Mariniere was very
fierce; there had been trouble with him before now. Ah! he must turn his
back on Helene and see what it meant, this cursed interruption. What
were they doing to let that beast roam about alone? And even as he
turned the shriek tore the air again, and now he could hear a man's
voice, rough and furious, a confusion of voices, the stamping of a
horse, the creaking of harness. No! Bellot the bull was not the
aggressor here.

Angelot loosened his hunting knife as he ran along the lane. It turned
sharply once or twice between its banks, dipping into the hollow, then
climbing again to La Mariniere. At its lowest point it touched the elbow
of a stream, winding away under willows to join the river near Lancilly,
and overflowing the lane in winter and stormy weather. Now, however, the
passage was dry, and at that very point a group of figures was
struggling. Angelot had the eyes of a hawk, and at that distance knew
them all.

General Ratoneau was on horseback; his gold lace flashed in the
sunlight. Before him on the horse's neck lay a girl's white figure,
flung across the front of the saddle, struggling, shrieking, held down
by his bridle hand which also clutched her dress, while with the
butt-end of a pistol he threatened Marie Gigot, who screamed for help as
she hung to the horse's head. He, good creature, not being one of the
General's own chargers, but a harmless beast borrowed without leave from
the Lancilly stables, backed from Marie instead of pushing and trampling
her down in obedience to his desperate rider. Little Henriette did her
best by clinging tightly to the white folds of her cousin's gown as they
fell over the horse's shoulder, and was in great danger of being either
pushed down or kicked away by Ratoneau, as soon as he should have
disposed of Marie.

"Let go, woman!" he shouted, with frightful oaths. "Let go, or I'll kill
you! Do you see this pistol? A moment more, and I'll dash your brains
out--send you after your master, do you hear?--Ah, bah! keep still,
beauty!" as Helene almost struggled away from him. "I don't want to hurt
you, but I will have what is my own. Get away, child, we don't want you.
Morbleau! what's that?"

It was a sound of quick running, and Riette's keen