Hell Bent Wade is the victim of an attack in which is wife is killed and daughter kidnapped. A couple of decades later, he is a sheriff known only as the "mysterious rider," because of his nighttime prowls in search of cattle rustlers.
Major Carter, owner of the Sunset mines, reads of a reward offered for Cheyenne Harry if captured. The butler gives him a telegram telling of the flooding of several shafts in his mine. He is soon on the way to the mine in his car. Ruth, his daughter, follows in her roadster.
Billy Milford, Harvard graduate, goes west to seek his fortune. In Addertown he secures a position as stationmaster of the L. & R. Railroad, but is forced out because of his drinking habits. He accidentally meets Gunhild, an emigrant Norwegian girl, as she arrives in Addertown to take up her home with Jan Hagsberg, the town's saloonkeeper. Seeking revenge on the railroad, Milford joins Jim Dorsey in a scheme to hold up the road's paymaster on his way to pay the employees of the company's mine.
The sheriff, Dan Beckham, and his deputy, Bud Cameron, are posting signs offering a reward for the capture of Cheyenne Harry, accused of holding up a Wells Fargo shipment. Shortly after they have tacked the sign to a tree Cheyenne Harry removes it.
A serio-comic tale shows wherein the East and the West strangely mingle despite Kipling's declaration that: "Never the twain shall meet."
Henry Martin receives a letter from Buck Lessen, a convict about to be released from prison, telling him that his time is up and he is going to get him for sending him to prison and marrying his sweetheart, Jane. The Martins and their young daughter move away but Buck learns where they went. Buck is hiding on the porch, planning to ambush Henry when he comes out. Two drunken cowboys ride by firing their pistols. When Henry comes outside he sees Buck's body lying in the grass, shot to death by a stray bullet.
Helen Martin takes her father's place when he is too ill to carry out his duties as Sheriff, and followed by Jim Grey, tracks down Blackie Wells, notorious 'bad man,' who has shot up a town. The trail leads over prairie and woodland, ending when Helen assumes the part of a dancing girl in the Last Chance saloon and learns the hiding place of Blackie and his associates.
Neil Allison is tricked into assaying some false samples from a young crook's mine. When Neil sees that he has been duped, a quarrel ensues, and Jim Starke, the youth, is stabbed by an unknown assassin. Neil runs away thinking he has committed murder and becomes the unwitting partner of the victim's father.
Tiger Thompson promises a dying train robber to mind his innocent daughter and return the stolen loot. Along the way, Thompson is attacked by the dead man's gang but manages to reach the law (and the girl) in one piece and with the stolen money intact.
J. Wesley Pringle and S. S. Thorpe are running against each other for sheriff. Unscrupulous Thorpe has his gang kidnap Pringle to prevent his win but Georgie Hibler, the daughter of Pringle's biggest supporter and her good friend, Fite, whom Pringle had saved from suicide, team up to saves him from the gang. Pringle wins the election and the girl!
Gracia, a half-breed Indian girl, plots with Cons Saunders to steal cattle from Blake because he is oblivious to her charms. With his stock gone, he cannot repay the money he owes his Uncle Benedict, and when Benedict is murdered, Blake is suspected. Because Blake has taken care of Saunders (Cons's father) for the many years he has been without the use of his legs, the latter is finally conscience-stricken and confesses to the crime, thus freeing Blake to marry Diana.
A boy's father is an unjustly accused fugitive, and the boy's scheming uncle plots to become the youngster's guardian and take over the family fortune.
The only key to a young woman's fortune lies in a marking on the leg of a horse called The Ghost of the Gauchos. But the woman's guardian, her uncle, plots to steal her wealth.
Bruce McLeod returns from the goldfields to find that his wife has left home with another man, taking their child. After the death of the mother, the child is adopted by Cherie, a local dancehall girl ostracized by the community. Cullum, a gambler who earlier seduced Mrs. McLeod, drifts into the town, and failing to win Cherie, he swears vengeance. McLeod, seeking the man who wrecked his home, falls in love with Cherie but scorns her when he discovers that she is a dancer. Ultimately, the child identifies Cullum as the gambler who lured Mrs. McLeod from her home. In the ensuing fight, Cullum is shot by a halfbreed, and Bruce is happily united with Cherie.
A drifter hobo is falsely accused of killing a saloon owner
A story of greed and lust driven by gold fever. Rapacious Kate Kent abandons her daughter Betty to run off with Tom Romaine, her husband’s killer during the Gold Rush. A quindecinnial later Betty heads to California and partners with Tennessee, a freind of her father’s, in the Golden Princess Mine. Kate and Romaine try and dupe Betty into believing he is Betty’s father to get control of her portion, but Tennessee reveals the truth and after an attempt on their lives all works out as it should.
When the Great Chief's body is placed before the funeral pile by his mourning braves, his sacred blanket is covered over it and a sentinel left to watch that this, his last resting place, is not desecrated. The tribe has just departed for their village when a mountain outlaw appears and succeeds in stealing the blanket, having given the sentinel doctored whiskey. When the Indians discover this they exile the unfaithful sentinel until he can recover the blanket.
Billy Carter and two Mexicans, Cuteo and Estaban, are smugglers of opium which they bring across the border from Mexico into the United States. The authorities are unable to apprehend them, so "Pinnacle" Bill and "Cheyenne" Harry of the Arizona Ranger Service are sent to assist the sheriff, Dan Beckham, and the inspectors in their search.
A reformed outlaw give up the girl because of his past.
Out of the talk at the Sportsmen's Club arises a wager between the globe-trotter and his friend, who bets that he will not be able, within a fixed time, to find his way out of an isolated mountain location to which he will lead him.