The Beaver Coat – The Law distracted by a greater mission

In The Beaver Coat, Mrs. Wolff ultimately gets away with a series of crimes. These crimes are poaching, theft of some firewood, and theft of the beaver fur coat. Mrs. Wolff gets away with this by manipulating her friends and enemies the same. Mrs. Wolff acts innocent and uses various tactics to deceive Wehrhahn. As the story progresses Wehrhahn’s admiration for her honesty keeps building.

Mrs. Wolff’s deception and manipulation are not the only reasons she gets away in the end. Wehrhahn has what seems to be a mission of his. He is focused on finding, “sinister people and elements that are politically outlawed or hostile to the crown or aristocracy." Wehrhahn is just annoyed by the complaint of the stolen beaver coat. He is more worried about the democratic and socialist tendencies he suspects in Kruger and the young Fleischer. This “greater mission” distracts Wehrhahn from what should be an easily solved case.

This aspect of The Beaver Coat suggests that the government can be too focused on certain things that those things become distractions from what really needs to be done or from what should be done. Wehrhahn’s priorities are out of order and that suggests that the government or people of authority may have their priorities out of order. Instead of protecting the people under them, they protect their interests.