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Bootlegging chief Blackie is killed by Pop Cooley at the urging of Big Fella Maskal because Blackie was against Maskal's involvement with Blackie's gun moll Aggie.  After Pop shoots Blackie, he passes the gun to his step-daughter Nan, and she naïvely takes the rap for her father, believing the mob will arrange for her acquittal.

While in prison, Pop recruits Nan's straight boyfriend, "The Kid," a sharpshooter with the circus, into the illegal beer trade.  When he visits Nan in a fur coat, she becomes terrified of his involvement with Pop's gang after witnessing a fellow inmate's mobster boyfriend being gunned down outside the prison gate the day the girl was to go home to him.  Earlier, however, Nan had recommended The Kid take a job with her stepfather so they would have enough money to marry.

Having served her term, Nan is released safely into The Kid's arms, but returns home to find her father unrepentant and involved with a loose, gold-digging woman named Pansy.  Maskal soon takes a strong liking to Nan and throws her a homecoming party, forcing her to dance with him all evening.  When The Kid finally asserts his claim over Nan, Maskal threatens him, then later sends his thugs to kill him, but The Kid successfully disarms them, then goes after Maskal.

Terrified her lover will be killed, Nan goes to Maskal to warn him and offers herself to him in exchange for The Kid's life.  Aggie, now Maskal's mistress, shoots him with Nan's gun after he leaves her for Nan, and Nan is accused of murder.  The Kid then names himself mob chief and escapes with Nan in a car with three of Maskal's men, who aim to kill him.  By racing a train and maintaining high speeds, The Kid keeps himself alive until Nan pulls a gun on the men and disarms them.  Dropping the thugs off with "no hard feelings," The Kid tells them he has quit the beer business, and he and Nan drive off.