Writing
Irene Fletcher, the pampered daughter of a Long Island millionaire on the brink of bankruptcy, has two suitors - struggling architect John Marshall, and wealthy clothing designer Charles Munson. Scorning her father's plea for her to curb her passion for beautiful clothes and live more modestly, she trips and is knocked unconscious. In a dream, Irene's father goes to Munson for financial assistance and Munson agrees, in exchange for her father agreeing to try to influence Irene to marry him. When it is announced at Irene's birthday party that she and Marshall have secretly married, Munson refuses to lend the money to Irene's father, who then kills himself with a pistol. After a series of tragic events, Irene awakens, and decides to marry Marshall.
During a carnival in Venice, Horace Pierpont, a wealthy American (Lewis Stone), falls in love with Fay Kennion (Virginia Valli). Their romance is derailed when she goes over to his apartment and finds the vampy Fifi (Nita Naldi) there. Fay goes down to Algiers, where she marries a former sweetheart, Dr. Alan Mortimer (Edward Earle).
After his divorce Robert Collingwood loses his fortune in Wall Street and becomes mentally unstable. He then attempts to harm his daughter, Gail, but dies in a fall. Fifteen years later, Gail, now a reporter, becomes involved with a man named Thorne, who is also known as Edward North. Thorne is later revealed to be the man who had an affair with Collingwood's wife.
On her wedding day, Norma Huntley wants to tell Edward Berkley, her husband-to-be, her secret -- that she mothered a child out of wedlock which subsequently died. Her mother forbids her to reveal this. Only moments after the ceremony, it is discovered that the child, now three, is actually alive. Berkley, incensed at this turn of events, agrees to adopt the child and remain married for appearance's sake -- but when he finds the father, he will kill him.
An outcast who runs a road house of ill repute leads his mother to believe him dead. His only friend, a doctor, falls for a married woman.
Maria Lopez is the daughter of an American mother and a Mexican father, who is the head of a band of insurgents. As a child, she was kidnapped by her father and raised south of the border to hate gringos. She begins to like them a lot better when, during an escape from some Mexican "Rurals," she crosses the border and is captured by Texas Ranger Danny O'Neil. He lets her go, and they fall in love, but their romance is interrupted when she hears that her father has been captured by Americans.
A young woman mistakenly believes she has killed a man in a struggle to repel his unwanted advances.
Tells of a waif from the sea, who on the death of her guardian and protector, is forced to make her own way in New York. Her lack of guile and sophistication wins her a place and esteem. Entering a romance which involves both father and son, the girl is the pivot around which revolve petty jealousies, aristocratic conventions and gambling affrays. She eventually casts aside the worthless son and marries the father.
