When her drunken, irresponsible parents decide to separate, Sue Hartley disgustedly leaves home and gets a job as a manicurist; she is fired the first day, but Varden, a man-about-town, gets her a position as a modiste's model. One evening, Sue is sent to an apartment on the pretext of modeling clothes for a woman customer and finds Varden there, cruelly determined to have his way with her. Sue manages to telephone her sweetheart, Jim, who rushes to the apartment, gun in hand; Varden is shot to death, and Jim is arrested by the police. It soon turns out, however, that the fatal bullet was fired by another man (the father of a girl raped and murdered by Varden), who saw Varden attack Sue from his position on the fire escape. The elder Hartleys are reunited, and Sue and Jim seem likely to follow them into wedlock.