Summary
A predatory magnetism defines the revivalist Davids, whose charismatic pulpit presence masks a hollow core of opportunism. He ensnares the guileless Daire Vincent, orchestrating an elopement that promises a union never truly consecrated. As his ambition outgrows the provincial horizon, Davids—fueled by the whispers of unscrupulous associates—abandons his pregnant companion for the glittering, cutthroat avenues of New York. While he ascends to the heights of urban prestige, Daire descends into the purgatory of the 'Mozart'—a subterranean dance hall where her voice becomes a commodity for survival. The narrative pivot occurs when Davids, now entangled with a dying, childless wife and a sanctimonious Purity League, is forced to confront the wreckage of his past. A violent raid on the very establishment harboring Daire leads to a blood-soaked reconciliation, facilitated by the stoic intervention of Father White. The child, a silent witness to their fractured morality, becomes the catalyst for a legal and spiritual legitimacy that eventually pulls both souls from the mire of their mutual degradation.
Synopsis
Revivalist Davids persuades Daire Vincent to elope with him. Within the year, inspired by his associates to seek a held of greater grafting possibilities, he deserts her without having made her a wife, and goes to New York, where he meets with great success. Daire has a child, and after many failures, becomes a dance hall singer to support it. In New York she is approached by Davids' confederates who ask her to help them in raiding the Mozart dive in which she works. She thus discovers Davids' present whereabouts and activities, and, taking her child, confronts him. Davids' young wife is dying, childless. The sight of his own son, whom he cannot claim, stirs him deeply and with a regenerating effect. The wife dies. Davids, insistently urged by the Purity League to do this, makes a raid on the Mozart. He is wounded. Father White, a slum worker, striving for Daire's spiritual upliftment, hears her life's story and intercedes with Davids to legitimatize the child. Davids and Daire go through a marriage ceremony. Later each is shown rising from the depth to a fuller and better knowledge of life.
