Ranch foreman Kerry has boarded with Kitty Tynan and her mother for five years in western Canada, his past is a mystery to everyone. He is actually an English aristocrat who lost all his money gambling and left the country in search of work. Kerry and his friend Horan own an option on property which crooked lawyer Burlingame is trying to secure. Burlingame's cohort Logan murders Hogan, and is caught and arrested. In the trial, Burlingame forces Kerry to admit his past, and succeeds in preventing Kerry from receiving bank assistance. When Kerry is shot, Kitty opens a letter from Kerry's wife that he had been carrying for five years, and cables her. Kerry's wife arrives and informs him that his last bet in England had turned out to be a $20,000 winner. Kerry is able to use the money just in time to foil Burlingame and secure the property, thus winning prosperity and the affections of his wife.
Adventuress Leonie Sobatsky falls in love with a young man named Nevil Trask, and he with her. Trask doesn't know that Leonie is actually the head of an international smuggling ring--and Leonie doesn't know that Trask is an undercover Secret Service agent assigned to break up the ring and capture its head.
To protect her brother, a nightclub entertainer Queenie Morgan marries a gangster. She bears a resemblance to a society girl who has gotten involved with the underworld and wound up shooting her gangster boyfriend, and the gang forces Queenie to impersonate the woman in order to extort money from her wealthy parents. Unfortunately the society girl is killed by the gang, and the police arrest Queenie for the murders of both the society girl and her boyfriend.
Young Victor Jones of America is discovered to be an exact lookalike for England's Earl of Rochester, a circumstance which results in Jones deciding to replace the Earl after an unfortunate accident.
Glenn Higgins and Patsy Jones are a song-and-dance team traveling the vaudeville circuit across the United States, and land in a Kentucky tank-town filled with sharpies and wise-guys , wearing spats and carrying canes, who have reasons for wanting a horse named "Hot Heels, not to win the race he is scheduled to run in. This does not bode well for the vaudevillians as Glenn, acting on a hot tip from a hot vamp, has bet the pair's bankroll on "Hot Heels" to win.
After locksmith Joe Sands is acquitted of charges he cooperated in a burglary, master criminal Steve Benson, who poses as a philanthropist, asks him to join his gang. Joe refuses, but because his crippled brother needs an operation, he robs a safe. Joe is caught, but Sadie, a member of Benson's gang, saves him. Because Joe again refuses Benson's offer, Benson turns Joe over to the police. Joe is saved from prosecution by the man whose safe he robbed, the physician who operated on his brother. Finally, Joe, Sadie and the brother start life over in the country.
Cordelia Marlowe comes from a society family that has lost its fortune. She falls into the clutches of D.K. Franklin, a crooked lawyer who specializes in blackmail, and finds herself involved in Franklin's scheme to extort money from a family friend. She sets out to protect her friend's money and expose Franklin for the thief he is.
A meeting of Saxonian secret service heads in the Bergenschloss is called to discuss the fate of one of their agents who failed a mission in a South American republic due to the actions of Yorke Norroy, a clever American diplomatic agent posing as a man of fashion. The Saxonian leaders then plan for Norroy's destruction.
A young newspaper man from San Francisco arrives in the Yukon to start a newspaper and conflict ensues. Based on the poem by Robert W. Service.
During the illness of her father, Toni Carter, Milly takes his place as station agent. Both Dave Snowden, a freight engineer, and Bill Mailey love her. Bill, a land express courier, who distrusts and dislikes Dave sees that both the girl and her father favor his rival and decides to disgrace the station agent and his daughter.
A trusted laundromat employee is sent to the bank to cash the payroll but is robbed by a couple of thugs then locked up in a closet and cuffed with shirts hand and foot. One thug writes a note on an old cuff to his friend to meet him at the station. When the landlady comes in, she takes that cuff with other wash and sends it at once to the laundry where its discovery makes possible not only the rescue of the prisoner and the capture of the outlaws, who are cuffed in steel.
Young thief “The Bat” to distract an old bookseller, while his partner, “The Fly,” robs the till, purchases a book at random. Later, after a chase and escape to the Devil's Roost, Old Meg's refuge for thieves, he takes the book from his pocket and is about to throw it aside when the title attracts him, "Electricity Made Simple." Intrigued, the volume opens a new life to him and in time enables him to rescue the bookseller’s daughter Bess when she falls into trouble.
Denounced for preaching socialism Reverend Frank Gordon founds his own "Temple of Man." financed by Kate Ransom, the woman Gordon has fallen in with love and entered into a common-law agreement with after divorcing his wife. With the outbreak of World War I, however, the members of his new congregation oppose conscription while he wholeheartedly supports the Allied cause. Driven from his own church, he returns home to find Kate in banker Mark Overman's arms, enraged he strangles the banker. Sentenced to life imprisonment, his ex-wife Ruth pleads with Governor Morrison to pardon the errant clergyman. Gordon is allowed to return to his family.
Julian Randolph, a disreputable lawyer, gains an ad interim appointment to the Supreme bench as a reward for fixing a jury that acquits the brother of the political boss of a charge of murder. He was promised the nomination for the full term at the next election, but gains it only through threat of exposure of a bigamous marriage contracted by the boss. Then comes love for a noble woman and the question whether he shall take defeat with honor or gain seeming honor at the cost of his manhood. It is a momentous problem, but he makes a decision that proves him worthy of the robes of honor.
Having misused funds held in his trust by investing them with his friend, Henry Lowe, Robert Reardon appeals to his future son-in-law, James Calvin, a candidate for the position of district attorney, for help. When Calvin threatens to indict Lowe for fraud if he is elected, Reardon's anger becomes so great that the engagement between Calvin and Reardon's daughter Helen is broken, resulting in Reardon's suicide. After Lowe comes into possession of a check forged by Helen's brother Jack, he uses the document to force a marriage with Helen. Treated brutally by her husband, Helen seeks Calvin's aid, but Lowe frames Calvin, now the district attorney, in a compromising situation with his ex-fiancée. Calvin is about to resign when Helen traps her husband with some marked money, causing his suicide through disgrace. Thus freed, Helen and Calvin find happiness together.
Millionaire Joshua Barker insists that his daughter, Faith, must marry Phil Langhorne, a man that neither likes, and Faith is in love with and eager to marry her childhood sweetheart, John Temple.
Suspected of smuggling, Eileen Caverly boards the Connecticut Limited where she befriends Helen Raymond who is traveling with her new husband Bob Guerton. Helen confides they had recently married impulsively, the service performed by a justice of the peace. Shortly after their talk the train is wrecked, Helen is killed and Bob injured. Seizing the opportunity Eileen poses as Bob's wife to avoid capture. Bob’s mother visits him, learning that they were married by a Justice of the Peace, insists they be married by a minister. Bob becomes successful with Eileen’s support, and they have a son. All is well until Cromwel Crow, who knows of Eileen's past, is released from jail. Demanding $5000 for his silence they struggle, Bob enters and in the ensuing fight, Crow is killed. Eileen's secret dies with her adversary, freeing her to continue her life.
When his buddy is murdered a dedicated cop, goes after the gang responsible.
A reporter and a detective team up to solve the murder of a nightclub singer who had been involved in a divorce scandal.
A lady gambler shields her brother by claiming responsibility for a forgery he committed.