On the Spanish island of Majorca lives the Faneaux family, product of a degenerate English father of good family and a Spanish woman, whom he had not married. Following the father's death, poverty has driven the daughter, Emilia, into shady living and the brother, Rodney, into disreputable adventures. Rodney, tortured by the realization that his life is doomed to be wasted in penury, urges his sister to marry Ewing, a crooked but immensely wealthy film actor. But Emilia rebels and soon afterwards falls in love with Jerome Hautrive, an aristocratic English writer. Rodney and Ewing plan to fleece the Englishman but when Rodney sees in Jerome the man that he might have been, he comes to his side, rescuing him from a dangerous predicament. Thereafter he remains his devoted servant. With the marriage of Jerome and Emilia imminent, the jealous Ewing persuades Emilia that the difference in there social stations will make both of them miserable. Convinced that Ewing has spoken the truth, Emilia returns to her old ways. Jerome discovers her dancing in one of the lowest dives. But still his love burns for her. Thereupon Ewing, in a last desperate effort to make the girl his own, abducts her. Jerome hotly pursues and after a terrible struggle, in which Ewing is wounded, saves her. A short time later Jerome and Emilia are married in England and through the good offices of Jerome, Rodney and an older brother are both settled in positions to which their blood entitles them.