Young couple gets married in secret because her family objects to the match. To escape the family the couple goes into hiding.
World War I veteran Jack Dunbar who, like a lot of veterans then and now, is finding it hard to land a job. When he fixes the broken down auto of the newly rich Nicholas Small, he finally runs into some luck. The blustery Small explains that the way to get ahead is to blow your own horn, and then he takes Dunbar to an estate, where he is introduced as a millionaire.
John Grey enlists when the Spanish-American War begins, not knowing that his sweetheart Mary is pregnant and then perishes before they can legalize their union. When Mary dies, her daughter Little Mary is taken into an orphanage and adopted by Peters, a cruel farmer who turns her into a slave. Befriended by Seppe, a hunchback farmhand of similar parentage, young Mary escapes to the city where she finds work at a hospital run by Dr. Strong. She falls in love with Strong's son Donald when he learns that she is illegitimate, he backs out of the engagement.
