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The Bondage of Fear Synopsis

Vesta Wheatley and Dick Mortimer have been friends from childhood, but when he declared his love and asks her to marry him, she tells him their friendship is too pleasant to spoil it by love-making. John Randolph, a wealthy city man, is attracted to Vesta and a romance develops which culminates in a quiet wedding. Although Vesta is happy she enjoys tasting of worldly pleasures unknown to her. However, after a short fling she returns to her husband with increased love and respect. Unable to stand village life, after Vesta's marriage, Dick comes to the city. He and Vesta meet by chance and he avails himself of her invitation to call. John, returning home unexpectedly, is surprised to find Dick talking to his wife; he recalls a scene in the country before his marriage, when he saw Dick making love to Vesta. However, he hides his suspicions and he and his wife go to their country lodge. Beset by thoughts of Vesta, Dick follows and during her husband's absence, enters the lodge. Vesta resents his declaration of love, and hearing a noise on the outside, begs him to leave before her husband returns. The door is burst open and Skinny, a gangster, enters. In the struggle that ensues Dick is killed by Skinny. Vesta grabs the pistol and holding Skinny at bay, prepares to call the police, but Skinny tells her that she bad better think before phoning, as the news will create a scandal. Cowed by his threats, Vesta is compelled to watch in silence as he drags Dick's lifeless body away. Although her husband suspects nothing, Vesta is haunted with memories of Dick's murder, and Skinny, by frequent blackmail, helps keep alive the memory. At last she feels that she can bear it no longer and when Skinny comes with a demand for an enormous sum, she seizes a pistol and kills him. She then phones to the police, telling them she is alone in the house and hears a burglar entering; there is a pistol in her husband's room. The burglar is approaching, what shall she do? The officer tells her to hold the burglar off until help comes. With the receiver down, she fires a shot into the air. When the officers arrive they pronounce the killing is self-defense, and Vesta is happy with her husband, knowing that her tormentor is out of the way.

Beyond the Wall Synopsis

Dane Ashley, a successful young author, is informed that he has inherited an old estate in a small village, and being tired of his work and life in the city, he decides to go down and stay on the place for a brief rest. One day Dane is amazed to find a crowd of boys and girls pelting a young girl. He rescues the girl and would punish her tormentors, but she begs him to let the matter drop and hurriedly disappears through the door in the stone wall which separates his house from the one next to it. Much impressed with his young neighbor, Dane makes inquiries about her and learns that she is a Miss Virginia Carlton and that nothing is known concerning her except that she is crazy. Disbelieving the rumors as to Virginia's insanity, Dane uses clever little ruses to further his acquaintance, and the friendship so strangely begun, soon develops into love. Although Virginia cannot conceal her love for him, she tells him their friendship must cease, that there is a wall of shame and misery between them which prevents their ever being anything to each other. Dane thinks he has guessed her secret when he hears a baby at play on her side of the wall; he believes she has been the victim of an unwise and too-great love, but when he is with Virginia her purity and innocence totally contradict this theory. One night he is startled to see a face, which he is sure is Virginia, which is lit is lit up by a wild and impish gleam, peering in at his window. When he reaches the window he sees the girl fleeing over the high stone wall. A few nights later he meets her on the road. She gives no sign of recognition, but leads him on. Dane cannot understand; his heart sick at the thought that the pure-souled Virginia, whom he loves could act thus wantonly, but the next day, when he meets Virginia, she is again the sweet simple girl and he becomes convinced that it must be during moments of temporary insanity that she makes her nocturnal excursions. Nightly the girl is seen in the village, a beautiful evil spirit luring men from their firesides, to render them mad with strange passions and unfulfilled desires, for she always escapes from her victims. At last Virginia can restrain her feelings no longer and she tells Dane that she wants him to hear her story and to help her. Two years before, her twin sister, Helen, had fallen in love with a young naval surgeon. When their father had sternly forbidden her ever to see him again, the impulsive girl left home and went to the surgeon's hotel. There she lived with him as his wife for two weeks, until he was suddenly called away to foreign waters. Returning to her father's home, Helen was injured in an automobile wreck and her mind shattered. The father died of the shock, and Virginia, realizing her sister's condition, had rented the house in the country. Here Helen's child was born. Dane is overwhelmed with happiness to know that the girl he loves is neither insane nor the mother of the child he had supposed hers. He tells Virginia he will locate her sister and bring her back. He sends his friend, Dr. Robert Haskell, to Virginia to aid her. Virginia denounces Dr. Haskell for his treachery to her sister, and before he can reply, Dane brings in the unconscious Helen, whom he found wandering about the streets. Doctor Haskell works over the wounded girl, and while they await anxiously the result of his operation, he explains to Virginia that she is doing both her sister and herself grave injustice. He tells the astonished girl that he and Helen were married on the day she left her father's home, and that ever since his return from the foreign parts he had been searching vainly for his wife. Gradually life and memory return to Helen and she throws her arms about her husband's neck as Virginia and Dane look on.