Nevertheless all inquiries made in that direction proved fruitless, and, indeed, the intelligence did not appear correct, as the squire had no servant whose house was in Brandenburg or even on the road thither. Men from Dresden, who had been at Wilsdruf a few days after the conflagration of the Tronkenburg, said that about the time specified a boy had come there leading two horses by a halter, and that he had left the animals, as they were in a very wretched plight and unable to proceed further, in the cow-shed of a shepherd, who had wished to restore them to good condition. For many reasons it seemed probable enough that these were the horses in question, but the shepherd of Wilsdruf had, according to the account of people who came thence, already sold them to somebody--it was not known to whom; while a third rumour, the originator of which could not be discovered, was to the effect that the horses were dead and had been buried in the pit at Wilsdruf. The brothers von Tronka, who, as might be supposed, considered this turn of affairs the most desirable, seeing they would be relieved by it from the necessity of feeding the horses in their own stable--which they must otherwise have done, as their cousin, the squire, had no stables of his own--nevertheless wished to be thoroughly assured that the circumstances were correctly stated. Accordingly Herr Wenzel von Tronka, in his capacity of feudal lord, wrote to the courts of Wilsdruf, describing very fully the horses which, he said, had been lent to him, and had since, unfortunately, been taken away, and requesting them to try to discover where those animals were stationed, and to desire the present owner, whoever he might be, to deliver them up at the stables of the Chamberlain von Tronka, on an indemnification for all expenses. In a few days the man, to whom the shepherd of Wilsdruf had sold the horses made his appearance and brought them, lean and tottering, tied to his cart, to the market-place of the city. Unfortunately for Squire Wenzel, and still more so for honest Kohlhaas, this man was the knacker from Döbbeln.