Summary
A fractious Eden unfurls along the tawny spine of Paradise Valley, where George Bell—lanky, hot-blooded, half-tamed—trades his father’s beloved stallion for a pocketful of dice and instant exile. The old man’s grief detonates like a dry thunderclap; the boy is banished eastward into the sooty labyrinth of St. Louis, swapping saddle leather for grain sacks and the ache of open sky for clattering cobblestones. Concurrently, Polly Martin—her cheekbones still bruised by her father’s fists—escapes a vertical death when the sotted patriarch plummets from a half-built iron skeleton. She dons the Salvation Army bonnet, a drab halo that cannot hide the crackle in her eyes. Their trajectories braid one midnight when George fells a whiskey-soaked predator pawing at her skirts; sparks arc between rescuer and rescued, yet her refusal to wed a man whose past smells of barn straw and misdemeanors hurls her back west as a private-duty nurse. Fate, ever the mischievous puppeteer, stations her at the very ranch George fled. There she coaxes Thomas Bell’s splintered tibia—and harder heart—toward wholeness, while the father, tasting an autumnal tenderness, dares imagine a life beyond cattle and regret. George, hearing rumor of her presence, gallops home. The triangle tightens: father, son, woman—each bearing a wound now pulsing with new blood. In a final, wordless covenant, Thomas abdicates his nascent claim on Polly so that the next generation may graft its scars onto something resembling hope. The curtain falls on three figures silhouetted against the Sierra sunset, no longer orphans of circumstance but an improvised clan stitched from penance and second chances.
Synopsis
Young and wild, George Bell lives with his rancher father, Thomas Bell, in Paradise Valley, California. When George sells his father's favorite horse, Mr. Bell turns him out, and George becomes a grain salesman in St. Louis. Meanwhile, Polly Martin lives with her father Bill, an ex-businessman who has sunk to day-labor because of his addiction to alcohol. Bill frequently abuses Polly, and when he falls to his death from a high girder, Polly becomes a nurse in the Salvation Army in St. Louis. George falls in love with Polly after he saves her from the advances of a drunk, but she will not marry him because of his wild past. Instead, she applies for a job in Paradise Valley as a nurse, where she renders aid to Thomas Bell, who has broken his leg. She nurses him back to health at his ranch, and he grows fond of her. Eventually, George learns that Polly is in Paradise Valley and follows her to the ranch. When Thomas discovers that his son loves Polly, he sacrifices his love for George's happiness, and all live together as a family.
