For hours on end Seppel lay all alone in the robber’s dark cave. Only the chain around his foot kept him from running away. But the chain would not come out of the wall. He shook it and tugged it with all his might, but it was no good. The chain was firmly fixed.

Toward evening Hotzenplotz came striding home again. He tipped the sack of snuff off his shoulder, flung his hat and coat into a corner and lit a candle.

“Well, Kasperl,” he said, “you’ve been lounging here all day. Now you’re going to work.”

First Seppel had to take off the robber Hotzenplotz’s dirty boots. Then Hotzenplotz unchained him.

“Go and light a fire on the hearth. I got myself a fat goose on the way home. When the fire’s going, pluck the goose and pop it on the spit. I like it nice and crisp all over, and take care not to burn it! Meanwhile I’ll make myself comfortable and put on my dressing gown.”

Seppel plucked the goose and roasted it. The smell of the roasting fowl rose to his nostrils as he turned the spit. He had eaten nothing since breakfast; he felt quite weak with hunger. Would the robber Hotzenplotz leave a morsel for him?

The robber Hotzenplotz, however, intended to do no such thing! When the goose was done, he cried “Supper time!” Then he gobbled up the delicious goose, while Seppel went hungry. There wasn’t so much as a bone left for Seppel to gnaw.

“Mm—that tasted good!” said the robber Hotzenplotz with a belch when he had finished. “Now I could do with a cup of coffee. . .”

He went to his cupboard and took out a coffee mill. It was Grandmother’s coffee mill! He filled it with coffee beans.

“There!” he said to Seppel. “Grind the coffee.”

So Seppel had to grind coffee for Hotzenplotz in Grandmother’s coffee mill. When he turned the handle the coffee mill played “Nuts in May.”

That hurt—it hurt worse than anything else that had happened this unlucky day.

“What’s the matter with you?” asked the robber Hotzenplotz, seeing tears spring to poor Seppel’s eyes. “You look so sad, Kasperl. That won’t do! Wait a minute—I’ll cheer you up!”

He tore the pointed cap from Seppel’s head.

“I don’t like you in that silly cap. It doesn’t suit you. There it goes!” He flung the cap into the fire and let it burn.

“Isn’t that funny?” he cried. “I’m killing myself laughing!”

Hotzenplotz roared with laughter. Seppel cried. He was still crying as he finished grinding the coffee, while Grandmother’s coffee mill played “Nuts in May.”

After that, Seppel had to clean and polish the robber’s boots. Then he was chained up again. Hotzenplotz lay down and blew out the candle.

Half the night Seppel couldn’t close his eyes. He felt so sad and homesick. He lay on the cold stone floor in between the barrel of gunpowder and the barrel of pepper, thinking about Kasperl.

What would Kasperl say when he heard that the robber Hotzenplotz had burned his pointed cap? Or would Kasperl ever hear about it at all?

“Oh dear me,” sighed Seppel. “What a dreadful mess we’re in, me and poor Kasperl.”

In the end he fell asleep. He dreamed of Kasperl and Grandmother. They were sitting in Grandmother’s house having coffee and pie—plum pie, of course—with whipped cream. Kasperl was wearing his pointed cap, and everything was all right and everyone was happy. There was no chain around Seppel’s foot, no robber’s cave, and no Hotzenplotz.

If only his dream need never come to an end!

But it did come to an end, far too soon for poor Seppel. At six o’clock sharp in the morning the robber Hotzenplotz woke up. He roused Seppel.

“Hey, lazybones!” he cried. “Get up! It’s time to start work.”

There was coffee to grind, wood to chop, a fire to be lit. Then Hotzenplotz devoured his breakfast while Seppel had to stand by and watch. Breakfast had to be cleared away; then there was water to fetch, and dishes to wash. After that, Seppel had to turn the grindstone while Hotzenplotz sharpened his curved sword and his seven knives.

“Get a move on, slowcoach!” shouted the robber. “This is a grindstone, not a barrel organ! Faster, faster!”

When all the knives were sharpened, Seppel had to creep back to his corner and be chained up. Then the robber Hotzenplotz threw him a stale crust of bread.

“There—eat that, Kasperl, just so you don’t starve to death. I’m going to work now, the same as every day. You can take it easy and get some rest. You’ll have to work all the harder for me when I come home this evening! Why should you have a better time than your friend Seppel is having with the wicked magician Petrosilius Zackleman?”

With that he left the robber’s cave and shut the door behind him.