George Fugger, however anxious for the Devil's assistance, was too keen a man of business to wish to endanger his soul; so the object he set himself to accomplish was to obtain the Evil One's aid without paying the Evil One's price. The Devil was summoned, and he willingly enough undertook the task upon the usual condition, of the surrender at the end of life of the soul of the person he was helping. George Fugger, without hesitation, signed the bond with his blood, only stipulating for the insertion of a small clause, which provided that his Satanic majesty should on his part do Fugger one small service ere claiming the price of his assistance. The Devil must have been in a good humour, for he agreed to this quite willingly and unsuspiciously, and the two parties went their way, each well satisfied with his part of the bargain.
Teufelspalast was, naturally enough, of magnificent design, and at the time it was built was furnished with the most luxurious fittings and decorations that the mind of man or devil could imagine. Marbles of different kinds entered largely into its construction, and the gilding, decorations, and carvings were such as to become famous throughout even a country noted for great and beautiful palaces. When the building was completed, the Devil summoned the owner, and asked him to name the little service that he was to do him. George Fugger had thought out his little scheme of outwitting the Devil, and he took a bushel of corn and strewed it over the different floors of his vast mansion. Then he said to the Devil, "See! If you can gather together all the corn strewn about the palace grain by grain, and deliver it back to me without the loss of a single grain before morning, then my soul shall be yours. On the other hand, should you fail to do this, my soul remains my own as well as the palace you have built."
The Devil, we are told, was not in the least disconcerted by the task which had been set him, and without doubting for a moment that he would successfully accomplish it, he set to work to gather up the grain. In the end, just before sunrise he had completed his task, all but the finding of five grains of the corn. He searched high and low for the missing grains, but to no purpose, and ere he could find them daylight, which was to mark the end of the time allotted for his task, began to appear; but the Devil, notwithstanding the absence of the five grains, consoled himself with the thought that Fugger would never discover the loss of five grains amidst the many hundreds of thousands of others which he had heaped up in the measure. When Fugger came to see whether the Devil had performed his task or not, he counted out the number of grains of corn, and, of course, discovered the absence of the five, so he asked the Devil where they were.
"Oh," said the Devil, "they are there, the measure is piled quite full up, and you cannot be so particular as all that."
Fugger replied, "That is all very well, but five grains are missing, and I must have them, or you have not performed your task, and lose all claim to my soul in return for the palace you have so marvellously built me."
The Evil One replied, "You have miscounted the number. I have built your house and picked up all the grains of corn, and I am not going to be done out of my part of the bargain; besides, you cannot prove that there are five grains short."
"Oh yes, I can," replied Fugger; "stretch out your right hand." And the Devil, not seeing that it could be any harm to comply with the request, forthwith stretched out his great hand. Fugger seized it, and said, "There lie the five grains under your own claws. The corn I set you to pick up had been sanctified by being offered before the Holy Rood, and for this reason you were prevented from fulfilling your purpose. You have not collected the grains into your measure by dawn, as agreed, and therefore our bargain is annulled."
The Devil was in a terrible way. He did not see how to escape conviction of failure, and so he sought to terrify Fugger by an exhibition of his Satanic wrath. He set to work and began to attempt to tear down the building which he had so recently completed. But he no longer had any power over the palace, and only succeeded in breaking a sufficiently large hole in the wall to enable him to fly through it and depart.
For many years this hole, which had been bricked up, was shown to visitors, and was esteemed by many of the Trent people of the lower class as proof positive of the superhuman origin of the palace and the truth of the legend.
The end of the story is just what might be expected. The fair Claudia, who probably never meant to refuse the rich banker, consented to marry him, now that he had a home in Trent. And there they lived, so it is said, happily ever afterwards, and in due time died.