Summary
A dust-blasted sharecropper, George Leyden, relinquishes his only light—tiny, bright-eyed Marion—to the velvet-gloved philanthropy of Mrs. John Marshall, a matron whose wealth smells of lavender and rusted estate keys. Years unspool like silk: the child becomes a woman of porcelain intellect and storm-quiet loyalties, companion-nurse to the now-bedridden patroness. Enter Jimmy Harwood, fortune’s reckless heir, whose glance ignites Marion; their pulses drum against the marble hush of manor corridors. Yet when death hollows the lady of the house, gratitude mutates into betrothal: Marion, shackled by obligation, weds the widowed benefactor, a man more fossil than flesh. Jimmy, scalded, sails for continents of absinthe and rot, alongside George Straight, once the Midwest’s most scalpel-sharp criminal advocate, now a cynic with a liver like a battlefield. Marshall’s sudden demise—heart or poison?—detonates a feeding frenzy among vulturine kin. Marion, heavy with a child she will not name Marshall, flees to a night-city of trolley bells and anonymity. In a maternity ward divided only by thin plaster, her son draws first breath while, next door, another infant expires, blue and still. The clan seizes on the cosmic swap, branding Marion kidnapper and murderess. Rumors ride telegram wires back to Jimmy; he and the dissolute barrister steam home, chasing redemption through murky courtrooms and flickering lamplight. Witnesses crack, ledgers speak, a midwife’s trembling conscience tips the scales. Final reel: Marion, framed in cathedral-window dusk, regains both her fortune and the squalling proof of her integrity, while the camera lingers on Jimmy’s eyes—equal parts love and scar tissue.
Synopsis
Desiring the best for his little daughter Marion, impoverished farmer George Leyden agrees to allow her to become the ward of Mrs. John Marshall, a wealthy woman who has taken an interest in the child. Exposed to all the privileges in life, Marion grows into a well educated, beautiful woman and a loyal companion to Mrs. Marshall, who is now an invalid. Marion falls in love with Jimmy Harwood, a wealthy young man, but when Mrs. Marshall's death leaves her husband bereft of companionship, Marion agrees to marry her benefactor. Heartbroken, Jimmy goes abroad where, joined by the formerly brilliant criminal lawyer George Straight, he enters a life of dissipation. Meanwhile, Marshall dies suddenly and his scheming relatives accuse Marion of murder. Pregnant, she goes away to another city where her baby is born. At the time of its birth, another baby is born in an adjoining hospital room, only to die of suffocation. Fearing that the birth of the child may rob them of Marshall's fortune, the relatives maintain that it was Marion's boy who died and that she had gained possession of the other child to assure her fortune. Learning of the situation, Jimmy returns, accompanied by Straight, and after many tribulations, Marion's integrity is established and she is granted her baby and her fortune.
