The story is set in a small town near Naples early 1900. Baron Antonio Peletti is a stingy and cruel man who thinks only to spend the bare minimum needs for his son and future daughter-in-law, even if he lives in a luxurious house. The servant Contrado is forced to go hungry because of that miser, in fact every time that Antonio has to spend even a penny to buy something complained of unnecessary waste, exclaiming: "And I pay, and I pay!!" But one day his grandson who want to steal the box full of gold coins Antonio, hide under the bed has a way of revenge. But in order to steal the tape, the grandson needs the complicity of all higher institutions in the country, including the mayor, one of the most bitter enemies of Antonio. In fact, the man wants to build a primary school for the children of the village, but the cruel Antonio prevents the funding because they do not want to throw out a penny!. So the pharmacist really wants to deceive Antonio with a sleeping pill into believing that it gave him to drink a poison accidentally. Antonio bait this trap and believed to be in Hell, really desolate set up by the villagers, and then the hairs Baron finds a soul who persuades him to donate money to the mayor of the box to set up the school. Only then Antonio would be redeemed from their sins in the past and would go to the Paurgatory. However, during the operation something is wrong and Antonio realizes the trap of the villagers. The nephew not to lose money steals the cassette and runs away in a balloon with his girlfriend but Antonio joins him and the three hovering in the air. But due to a failure of the balloon starts to descend towards the sea and so must lighten it; Antonio will be forced into tears and throw away his box full of gold coins. He is now supposed to be sunk somewhere near Sardinia, but at the end of the story the baron, coming back from the island on a monkey in the very day of inauguration, eventually understands his mistakes and accepts to finance t