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Page 17
The young Frederick, during the conference, seemed agitated by a
variety of emotions. He soon, however, recovered his composure, and
an expression of determined malignancy settled upon his countenance,
as he gave peremptory orders that a certain chamber should be
immediately locked up, and the key placed in his own possession.
"Have you heard of the unhappy death of the old hunter
Berlifitzing?" said one of his vassals to the Baron, as, after the
departure of the page, the huge steed which that nobleman had adopted
as his own, plunged and curvetted, with redoubled fury, down the long
avenue which extended from the chateau to the stables of
Metzengerstein.
"No!" said the Baron, turning abruptly toward the speaker, "dead!
say you?"
"It is indeed true, my lord; and, to a noble of your name, will
be, I imagine, no unwelcome intelligence."
A rapid smile shot over the countenance of the listener. "How
died he?"
"In his rash exertions to rescue a favorite portion of his
hunting stud, he has himself perished miserably in the flames."
"I-n-d-e-e-d-!" ejaculated the Baron, as if slowly and
deliberately impressed with the truth of some exciting idea.
"Indeed;" repeated the vassal.
"Shocking!" said the youth, calmly, and turned quietly into the
chateau.
From this date a marked alteration took place in the outward
demeanor of the dissolute young Baron Frederick Von Metzengerstein.
Indeed, his behavior disappointed every expectation, and proved
little in accordance with the views of many a manoeuvering mamma;
while his habits and manner, still less than formerly, offered any
thing congenial with those of the neighboring aristocracy. He was
never to be seen beyond the limits of his own domain, and, in this
wide and social world, was utterly companionless - unless, indeed,
that unnatural, impetuous, and fiery-colored horse, which he
henceforward continually bestrode, had any mysterious right to the
title of his friend.
Numerous invitations on the part of the neighborhood for a long
time, however, periodically came in. "Will the Baron honor our
festivals with his presence?" "Will the Baron join us in a hunting of
the boar?" - "Metzengerstein does not hunt;" "Metzengerstein will not
attend," were the haughty and laconic answers.
These repeated insults were not to be endured by an imperious
nobility. Such invitations became less cordial - less frequent - in
time they ceased altogether. The widow of the unfortunate Count
Berlifitzing was even heard to express a hope "that the Baron might
be at home when he did not wish to be at home, since he disdained the
company of his equals; and ride when he did not wish to ride, since
he preferred the society of a horse." This to be sure was a very
silly explosion of hereditary pique; and merely proved how singularly
unmeaning our sayings are apt to become, when we desire to be
unusually energetic.
The charitable, nevertheless, attributed the alteration in the
conduct of the young nobleman to the natural sorrow of a son for the
untimely loss of his parents - forgetting, however, his atrocious and
reckless behavior during the short period immediately succeeding that
bereavement. Some there were, indeed, who suggested a too haughty
idea of self-consequence and dignity. Others again (among them may be
mentioned the family physician) did not hesitate in speaking of
morbid melancholy, and hereditary ill-health; while dark hints, of a
more equivocal nature, were current among the multitude.
Indeed, the Baron's perverse attachment to his lately-acquired
charger - an attachment which seemed to attain new strength from
every fresh example of the animal's ferocious and demon-like
propensities - at length became, in the eyes of all reasonable men, a
hideous and unnatural fervor. In the glare of noon - at the dead hour
of night - in sickness or in health - in calm or in tempest - the
young Metzengerstein seemed rivetted to the saddle of that colossal
horse, whose intractable audacities so well accorded with his own
spirit.
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