Miriam Lee is a young woman in New York who works hard for a living. Her life changes when she meets Joe Valdez, a handsome and ruthless gambler. After the couple is married Valdez opens an elegant gambling house and uses Miriam, who is nicknamed "the queen of the night", as bait to attract rich and gambling customers.—Ulf Kjell Gür

The story centers about Miriam Lee, whose life of drudgery is unrelieved until Joe Valdez enters it. She does not know that Joe in years past had eloped with Jim Calvert's wife and had been driven from the mining settlement where the event took place. Calvert had sworn he would find Valdez and have his revenge. Miriam's intimacy with Joe has its inevitable result. Her father forces her from the house, and Joe, simulating sympathy, offers marriage. Joe stages a fake ceremony, but the girl suspects nothing. She rejoices in being joined legally (as she thinks) to the man she has always loved, despite his faults. Joe prospers as the manager of a high-class gambling club, and Miriam herself becomes known as Myrtle Beaumont, Queen of the Night. Through her Joe has been able to win huge amounts from the rich, men she has lured to his establishment. When "Lucky" Carson arrives in New York, Joe plans to ensnare him. He sends Miriam on her usual errand, but "Lucky" understands the game she is to play, and goes through with it. In the incidents which ensue Carson recognizes Joe Valdez and telegraphs to Calvert in the west. Then Valdez comes face to face with his bitterest enemy. Miriam, who has prided herself on having been a faithful wife, now learns that she has never been a wife at all. And in the silence of the night, as Joe Valdez lies dead from a pistol shot of Calvert's, Carson tells his tale of love to Miriam.