A balloon seller with grand plans to win a scholarship clashes with a budding dancer and her circus troupe over a prime town-centre location.

Tobey Mitchell, a young Parisian balloon vendor with ambitions to become a designer of pageants, jealously guards his stand in the Street of the Poor. One day Jean's Dog Circus takes his stand, and Tobey is defeated by the fierce indignation of Mimi, the show's dancer. Mimi's grandfather, Michael, has saved his money so that she may study with the great Dulac, but when he is robbed, Michael is killed by a fall down a staircase. Although he affects indifference, Tobey cares for the grief-stricken Mimi; but he is angered when she gives him ideas for the pageant. Nevertheless, he finances Mimi's dancing lessons, so that he has no money for the pageant contest. Fifi, a cafe entertainer who robbed Michael, offers to finance Tobey, but he refuses. Mimi, learning that he has paid for her lessons, deserts a dancing engagement; meanwhile Tobey agrees to Fifi's plan but tries to withdraw his pageant when he learns of her perfidy. To his surprise, Mimi is the star of the show, and he wins the contest as well as her love.