In the late years of the 18th century, Felix and Peter, two journeymen, are travelling across the Spessart hills to Würzburg.

The owners are in league with the bandits, who this very night plan to abduct Franziska, the Comtesse von Sandau, who is travelling through the forest with a group including her fiancé, Baron Sperling.

The bandits send Baron Sperling on his way to convey their ransom demand for 20,000 guilders to Graf Sandau, Franziska's father.

When Graf Sandau finds out that the Comtesse has gone to the bandits he sends Baron Sperling to the inn with the ransom money.

He reveals to her that he is in fact the son of an Italian Count from whom Graf Sandau borrowed money in the past, which he never repaid.

The planned abduction of the Comtesse was intended to make Graf Sandau finally pay the money he owed.

The script was based on an 1826 novella by Wilhelm Hauff and written by Heinz Pauck and Luiselotte Enderle.

[1] An earlier film version of Hauff's story had been released in 1923, directed by Adolf Wenter and starring Friedrich Berger and Ellen Kürty.

[3] Kurt Hoffmann's The Haunted Castle and Glorious Times at the Spessart Inn were sequels of a sort to this film.