All the guests ran at once but the host said, “The three crazy apprentices have done this;” the lodgers confirmed it, and said, “It can have been no one else.”

The innkeeper, however, had them called, and said to them, “Have you killed the merchant?”

“All three of us,” said the first, “For money,” said the second; and the third added, “And quite right too!”

“There now, you hear,” said the host, “they confess it themselves.” They were taken to prison, therefore, and were to be tried.

When they saw that things were going so seriously, they were after all afraid, but at night the Devil came and said, “Bear it just one day longer, and do not play away your luck, not one hair of your head shall be hurt.”

The next morning they were led to the bar, and the judge said, “Are you the murderers?”

“All three of us.”