Jim Hardy, serving time for safe cracking, receives notice that his term has expired, and tells his cellmate, Rusty, that he is going to start life anew and keep straight. Rusty laughs at him and tells him he will not get a chance to reform, as the police will hound him to death. Hardy receives a new suit of clothes and five dollars, and is met up the prison door by his daughter, Helen. He gets work in a grocery store, but a detective recognizes him and tells the proprietor that he is harboring an ex-convict, and Hardy is discharged. Helen has been working and saving her money, and she suggests to her father that they go west and start life anew in the west. Hardy is given a chance to make good, being employed as a watchman in the little western bank. Lieut. Baker, of the U. S. Cavalry, meets Helen, and the two young people fall in love. Hardy writes to Rusty as follows: “Dear Pal Rusty: Got a good job as a night watchman in a bank. Don’t laugh. It’s on the square. Can you imagine me watching a safe with twenty thousand in it and dead easy to crack, but I’m temptation proof as long as I can let the Amber Devil, whiskey, alone. Look for a letter from you shortly. Your old pal, Jim Hardy.” A week later Rusty takes advantage of visiting day to secure access to the lockers, and escapes dressed in a guard’s uniform. He makes his way to Hardy’s town, and is taken in by the latter and fed and clothed. Detective Burton, on the trail of the escaped convict, follows his man. Rusty sees him in a saloon and rushes back in fear to Hardy. He plies Hardy with whiskey, and tells him that the detective will make him lose his Job, and that he had better crack the safe and get away with the money. Helen tries to interfere, but Rusty roughly tells her to keep still or he will tell her sweetheart her father is an ex-convict. That night they attempt to rob the bank. Rusty keeps watch while Hardy enters and blows open the vault doors. The detective is on the job, however, and Hardy finds himself looking into the barrel of a pistol held by Burton at the window. Rusty sneaks up behind the detective and deals him a crashing blow, rendering him unconscious. Helen, who has mustered up courage at the last moment to attempt to stop the robbery and save her father from crime, rushes up and is attacked by Rusty. Hardy runs to the defense of his daughter and in the scuffle is shot and killed, Rusty making his escape. The banker believes that his watchman has been killed by the burglar. Helen confesses everything to Lieut. Baker, who goes to the detective, when he has regained consciousness and persuades him to remain silent regarding Hardy’s past. He tells Helen that she is not to blame for her father’s sins, and marries her. Rusty flees into lands occupied by hostile Indians, and is attacked, meeting a tragic death.