Tom Wilson, who has grown up in a small town under the watchful care of his widowed mother, falls in love with Jane, the daughter of Judge Belknap, but the judge refuses his consent until Tom is able to support a wife in comfort. With a very good idea of his own ability, Tom thinks that he can win his fortune more quickly in the city than in the country and goes to New York, accepting a position at $15 per week which one of his father's friends has offered him. At his boarding-house in New York, Tom makes the acquaintance of a chorus girl named Amy, who immediately sets about fascinating him, partly for amusement and partly to make her lover jealous. The rest of the story concerns the manner in which Tom meets his downfall, the way in which he is saved from taking his own life as the result of shame and remorse, and the means through which he returns to the country town and regains his self-respect. Tom finally wins the approval of Judge Belknap, and the romance of Tom and Jane comes to a happy conclusion.
—Moving Picture World synopsis