Once, returning at night after a merry binge, Gabriel von Eisenstein left his drunken friend Falk, dressed in a bat costume, in the town square. Falk is terribly angry and decides to take revenge ...
Eisenstein was sentenced to eight days in prison for disturbing public order. He must go to serve his sentence tonight. But Falk invites him to spend the night at Prince Orlovsky's ball and go to prison in the morning. Eisenstein willingly agrees and leaves, tenderly saying goodbye to his wife.
Rosalind seems suspicious that her husband is going to prison in a tailcoat, but she has no time for him: her old friend Alfred must come, and she also hopes to have a good time. However, before Rosalind and Alfred had time to settle down comfortably, the director of the prison Frank came to the house to arrest Eisenstein. Seeing a man dressed in a robe, he takes him for the master of the house and takes him away.
Adele, Rosalind's maid, is also in a hurry to attend Orlovsky's ball, where she seems to have been invited by her cousin, the dancer Ida. Under the pretext that her old aunt was ill, she asks the hostess for leave and leaves, having pulled off one of her best dresses.
Celebration at Orlovsky's house. Eisenstein, courting Rosalind, posing as a Hungarian countess, gives her a beautiful pocket watch. Adele, and the disguised warden of the prison Frank, and Falk, who rubs his hands with pleasure, watching Eisenstein flirt with his own unrecognized wife, participate in the general fun.
Dawn is coming. Staggering, Eisenstein leaves the ball, not forgetting, however, that he must serve his term. Imagine his surprise when it turns out that a certain Eisenstein has already been imprisoned in one of the prison cells! The anger of the "real" Eisenstein is indescribable. But Rosalind, smiling, shows him the watch he presented to the "Hungarian Countess." Eisenstein, caught red-handed, can only come to terms ...