Fear routed every other passion. She realized
that she was unprotected, a mile from the Fort, out of the line of its
vision. The brutal head of the miller's son seemed to thrust itself
before her face. Overwhelmed with terror, she turned swiftly and ran,
striking blindly among the low bushes, her glance darting from right to
left. No one was to be seen for a moment; then she turned the corner of
a boulder and came upon a man. She shrieked and covered her face with
her hands, now too frightened to move. The man neither stirred nor
spoke; and, despite this alarming circumstance, her disordered brain,
in the course of a moment, conceived the thought that no subject of
Rotscheff would dare to harm her.
Moreover, her brief glance had informed her that this was not the
miller's son; which fact, illogically, somewhat tempered her fear. She
removed her hands and compelled herself to look sternly at the creature
who had dared to raise his eyes to the Countess Natalie Ivanhoff. She
was puzzled to find something familiar about him. His grizzled hair
was long, but not unkempt.
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