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 affair of the page, the huge and mysterious steed which that nobleman had adopted as his own, plunged and curvetted, with redoubled and supernatural fury, down the long avenue which extended from the Chateau to the stables of Metzengerstein. "No!"--said the Baron, turning abruptly towards 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 of a peculiar and unintelligible meaning shot over the beautiful 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 {99} 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 behaviour disappointed every expectation, and proved little in accordance with the views of many a manœuvering mamma--while his habits and manners, 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.