Adapted from Martin Brown's play, a singer marries a gentleman
who depends on his father, and she loses her child to this grandfather.
Sally (Irene Dunne) goes to England and sings. In the fog she
meets Leonard St. John (Phillips Holmes), who takes her to dinner.
They are married, but he says he lost his money. Leonard's father
Aubrey St. John (Lionel Atwill) learns they are married and says
he won't provide money. At Monte Carlo Leonard loses gambling,
and Sally is told that she is pregnant. Leonard tells her he is
going home to his father. Aubrey tells his son he must divorce
Sally. Leonard writes a letter he can never see her again. Aubrey
learns that Leonard shot himself, and Sally sees it in the newspaper.
Aubrey reads a letter that Sally will have a child, and he hires
a detective to follow her. Sally plays with her son and goes out
to work as a woman comes in. Aubrey and his lawyer arrive and
take the child. Sally sings in a café and learns that Aubrey
got a court order. She cries she will get him back. Sally calls
on Aubrey and begs to see her baby; but Aubrey refuses to let
her see him again.
Twenty years later in 1918 Leonard St. John Jr. (Douglas Walton)
is in the war and sneaks out to see Eloise Duval (Jean Parker).
He persuades her to sneak away from home to go to Paris. Leonard
asks Sally for a room and says he has a wife. He gets drunk, and
Eloise wants to go home. Leonard quarrels with Sally about the
room, and he is knocked out by a waiter. Sally gives Eloise money
to go home, and she tells Sally his name. Sally cries over him,
and he wakes in her room. Leonard has a low opinion of women,
because his father always blamed his mother, whom he says is dead.
Eloise's father Duval (Mitchell Lewis) looks for Leonard and fights
him. Leonard shoots him. Sally takes the gun and tells Leonard
to leave.
Aubrey asks Leonard about his case, and Leonard admits he did
it although Sally confessed. Leonard wants to tell the truth,
but his father says to follow her story. In the trial Eloise testifies
that her father would not attack Sally. Leonard says he left earlier.
Sally testifies, and Aubrey recognizes her. Sally says she shot
Duval in self-defense. The prosecutor (C. Henry Gordon) says that
Sally wiped off his fingerprints and is protecting her son. Leonard
confesses that he killed Duval in self-defense, and he embraces
Sally, saying that Aubrey was wrong. Sally visits Leonard in jail,
and he says he is studying and wants to go to America with her
after the two years.
This tragic melodrama hinges on an English gentleman who
does not know how to work and abrogates his life to his father.
Yet despite her long absence from his life, Sally becomes a positive
influence for her son.