Dr. Gabriel Eisenstein, legal counsel at Arabayam & Co., is serving an eight-day sentence in the Grinzing district prison for insulting a public official. At the same time, however, he is to attend Prince Orlofsky's ball on behalf of his employer, Basil Arabayam, posing as Marquis Renard with a fictitious wife. Said woman is to persuade the prince to donate oil-rich lands in Bakutin on the Black Sea to her, which are to be immediately transferred to Arabayam...