An Indian chief of the Arapahoe escapes the reservation where he has been living and takes along some of his warriors. The cavalry is sent out for them.
The west is the stamping ground for Paul Temple and his thespian associates. He is talking with his sweetheart, Jane Dinsmore, as Alice Robinson, Jane's intimate friend, enters with a letter from an erstwhile associate, advising her to go to New York and accept a place in the chorus. A word from Temple, and Alice has made up her mind. She leaves for New York. Temple and Jane have been married some time and are living unhappily, apart from the old folks. The former's reputation as a heavy actor is wide, but drink has degraded him. Subsequently, Jane dies, due to Temple's abuse of her.
At the urging of his sweetheart, Rosemary Smith, a man (William Fairbanks) leaves his soft job in the east and goes west to settle a dispute over oil lands owned by Rosemary's father. This man evicts the wrong party and later must return west in order to set things right, protecting the honor of a girl from the advances of the crooked foreman.
Lafayette Jordan (Davis), financier, plans to inundate Caribou Canyon and turn it into a reservoir, but the villagers will not sell him their land. Among the resentful villagers is Judson Forrest (Harlan), who wants to be an inventor. Mary Jordan (Bellamy), daughter of the financier, is hurt and spends a night at his home. Learning of his attitude toward her father, she poses as a domestic at the Jordan home. Later, in New York, Judson looks her up. He is trying to sell his invention and, to get funds, he mortgages his home. The village banker, in league with Jordan, sells the financier the mortgage, and a foreclosure threatens when Jordan's business agent Henry Mogridge (Miljan) double-crosses Judson. The youth thinks Mary working against him. Friends come to Judson's aid and he pays off the mortgage in the nick of time. He learns that Jordan knew nothing of the methods employed by his agent and that Mary loves him.
Eccles, a profligate old drunkard, is the father of two beautiful girls, Esther and Polly. George D'Alroy, a young officer in the British Army who is infatuated with Esther, brings his friend, Captain Hawtree, to call. The captain is greatly taken with the lively Polly, who makes him carry the teakettle about and generally dance attendance on her to the emphatic disgust of Sam Garridge, an ardent suitor for Polly's hand. Meanwhile Esther shows George a letter from an impresario offering her an engagement on the stage. The offer seems a veritable godsend to the girl, but she changes her mind when George asks her to be his wife instead. A few months after they are married, George receives the unpleasant news that he must sail for India with his regiment. Owing to her ultra-aristocratic ideas, George has not dared to tell his mother, the Marchioness D'Alroy, that he has married a girl of common origin, and he is in a quandary as to what provision he should make for Esther.
Dolly Mainard, en route to her father, a major at Fort Blaine, is escorted through dangerous Sioux territory by a cavalry detachment and Army scout Jim Cardigan. When Captain Blackwell offends some braves of Chief Gray Wolf's tribe, Jim is sent ahead to the Indian camp to ask for peace. Imprisoned by the Indians, he sends a message to Blackwell not to advance; Donlin, a renegade scout, tears the note in such a way that the message is distorted, and the entire force is killed. When Jim escapes, he is accused of treason by Blackwell, court-martialed, and sentenced to death; however, he escapes and rescues Dolly, her father, and Blackwell from Donlin's band of renegades. Jim discovers the missing portion of the note in Donlin's hat, proving his innocence. Dolly remains to become his wife.
It is a variation on the original legend of Alraune in which a Mad Scientist creates a beautiful but demonic child from the forced union between a woman and a Mandrake root. Not to be confused with the 1918 German version of Alraune.
A racing driver eludes kidnappers in time to win a race.
Babs Marvin loves David Darrow, a young lawyer. Babs' father, the powerful Senator Marvin, is supporting Eben Sprague for a seat in the State Legislature. Darrow discovers that Sprague is a crook and threatens to expose the candidate unless the senator agrees to switch his support to him. Babs opposes Darrow's decision, fearing that it will ruin his promising law career. Determined to defeat Darrow, she promotes the candidacy of the village pauper, Hank Dawes, and contrives an elaborate campaign based upon the slogan that Dawes' election would remove him from the welfare rolls. Dawes wins the election, but Darrow is consoled with Babs's love and the senator's support of his law career.
Boulevardier Sir Nicholas Thormonde (Lew Cody) has to choose between his mistress Suzette (Renée Adorée) and his virtuous secretary Alathea (Harriet Hammond) in wartime Paris.
A British beachcomber who lives on a Dutch colonial island in the South Seas. He is banished after missionaries claim he corrupts the native women, but he later tries to save them during a typhoid outbreak.
Elbert Carey, a trapper of wild animals, seeing the admiration of Dais, a native servant, for a jaguar, indicates that she may have it. The native woman secretly loves Elbert, but he is ignorant of this fact.
Theda Bara plays Princess Zara, who lives on a South Sea Island. A handsome young missionary (William B. Davidson) arrives and there is a romance, which is hindered by various complications including a typhoon.
George Cantor and Tom Johnson love the same girl; one wins the girl from the other and the loser leaves swearing revenge on his successful rival. A few years later, the two marry. George is a successful doctor; Tom is an unemployed laborer with a wife, a sick baby, and little food at home.
Bill, an initially unkempt office boy, world is changed when he becomes infatuated with Genevieve Reilly, a girl working in a different office. Driven by his desire to attract her attention, Bill begins to clean up his act and appearance, eventually turning into what a jealous coworker terms a "regular dude". The film culminates in Bill taking Genevieve out to lunch to impress her with his new, sophisticated persona.
Alisa Graeme journeys from Scotland to the U.S. to visit Jeremiah Wishart, an old wealthy friend of her grandfather. The invalid Jeremiah is charmed by Alisa and decides she would make a good wife for his favorite nephew, David. Without meeting Alisa, David refuses the arrangement and runs away. Later, Alisa also runs away rather than wed another of Jeremiah's nephews and meets a young billboard painter in the country.
Wade Hildreth is sent to New York from London to receive a diamond necklace for Lady Gwendolyn from the jeweler Arabin. A gang of crooks led by Pete Fielding, known as "The Shadow," plans to keep Hildreth from going to Arabin's until they have robbed the store. Actress Morn Light, whom the Shadow loves, agrees to entice Hildreth to her apartment to be imprisoned. When she warns Hildreth because she wants to avenge her father's death, which was caused by the Shadow, the Shadow overhears and captures them both.
Mary Murphy, the oldest waif in an orphanage, steals a dress and three dollars, then escapes to the city. Grosset, the superintendent of the institution, steals $10,000 on the same night, and Mary is suspected of the theft.
Manhattan model Marion Buckley hesitates to accept a marriage proposal from wealthy upstate department store owner Warren Rogers, a widower with two daughters, because of her previous affair with her employer Leon Kessler, who had promised to marry her.
A daredevil flyer delivers the night mail despite threats from weather and robbers.