He Walked Around the Horses | Page 3

and everything went black before my eyes. I thought I was having a fainting spell,

something I am not at all subject to, and I put out my hand to grasp the hitching bar, but
could not find it. I am sure, now, that I was unconscious for some time, because when my
head cleared, the coach and horses were gone, and in their place was a big farm wagon,
jacked up in front, with the right front wheel off, and two peasants were greasing the
detached wheel.
I looked at them for a moment, unable to credit my eyes, and then I spoke to them in
German, saying, "Where the devil's my coach-and-four?"
They both straightened, startled: the one who was holding the wheel almost dropped it.
"Pardon, excellency," he said, "there's been no coach-and-four here, all the time we've
been here."
"Yes," said his mate, "and we've been here since just after noon."
I did not attempt to argue with them. It occurred to me--and it is still my opinion--that I
was the victim of some plot; that my wine had been drugged, that I had been unconscious
for some time, during which my coach had been removed and this wagon substituted for
it, and that these peasants had been put to work on it and instructed what to say if
questioned. If my arrival at the inn had been anticipated, and everything put in readiness,
the whole business would not have taken ten minutes.
I therefore entered the inn, determined to have it out with this rascally innkeeper, but
when I returned to the common room, he was nowhere to be seen, and this other fellow,
who has given his name as Christian Hauck, claimed to be the innkeeper and denied
knowledge of any of the things I have just stated. Furthermore, there were four
cavalrymen, Uhlans, drinking beer and playing cards at the table where Jardine and I had
had our wine, and they claimed to have been there for several hours.
I have no idea why such an elaborate prank, involving the participation of many people,
should be played on me, except at the instigation of the French. In that case, I cannot
understand why Prussian soldiers should lend themselves to it.
Benjamin Bathurst

(Statement of Christian Hauck, innkeeper, taken at the police station at Perleburg, 25
November, 1809.)
May it please your honor, my name is Christian Hauck, and I keep an inn at the sign of
the Sword & Scepter, and have these past fifteen years, and my father, and his father,
before me, for the past fifty years, and never has there been a complaint like this against
my inn. Your honor, it is a hard thing for a man who keeps a decent house, and pays his
taxes, and obeys the laws, to be accused of crimes of this sort.
I know nothing of this gentleman, nor of his coach, nor his secretary, nor his servants; I

never set eyes on him before he came bursting into the inn from the yard, shouting and
raving like a madman, and crying out, "Where the devil's that rogue of an innkeeper?"
I said to him, "I am the innkeeper; what cause have you to call me a rogue, sir?"
The stranger replied:
"You're not the innkeeper I did business with a few minutes ago, and he's the rascal I
want to see. I want to know what the devil's been done with my coach, and what's
happened to my secretary and my servants."
I tried to tell him that I knew nothing of what he was talking about, but he would not
listen, and gave me the lie, saying that he had been drugged and robbed, and his people
kidnaped. He even had the impudence to claim that he and his secretary had been sitting
at a table in that room, drinking wine, not fifteen minutes before, when there had been
four noncommissioned officers of the Third Uhlans at that table since noon. Everybody in
the room spoke up for me, but he would not listen, and was shouting that we were all
robbers, and kidnapers, and French spies, and I don't know what all, when the police
came.
Your honor, the man is mad. What I have told you about this is the truth, and all that I
know about this business, so help me God.
Christian Hauck

(Statement of Franz Bauer, inn servant, taken at the police station at Perleburg, 25
November, 1809.)
May it please your honor, my name is Franz Bauer, and I am a servant at the Sword &
Scepter Inn, kept by Christian Hauck.
This afternoon, when I went into the inn yard to empty a bucket of slops on the dung
heap by the stables, I