A group steals a death ray in order to terrorise the world into peace. The inventor and his daughter try to retrieve the death ray with the aid of a government agent.

Mary Grant has a gambling father and a mother who has disappeared. Even though she has been raised in a convent she proves true to her ancestry by running away to Monte Carlo and spending her small inheritance at the gambling table.

On her debut as an opera star, Marion Stuart is interrogated and possibly implicated in the death of a male acquaintance. Released, although thoroughly shaken-up, Marion attempts to perform but loses her voice onstage. Humiliated, but driven to sing, she travels to South America under the assumed name of Maria Delasano, and works in an opera company under the tutelage of Feodor Glinka, who wants her to shun men and save herself for her art. Mary resists the persistent attentions of wealthy young Phil Roberts, who follows the company in hopes of marrying her. ...

Tim Goodwin and his wife Corrie are living in poverty when Tim's oil well strikes it rich. He soon works his way to the top of the social scale, but Corrie doesn't change at all--she stays a dour, drab woman with no social skills whatsoever. Tim gets so embarrassed by her that he hires a "social secretary" for her to teach her how to function in the social strata in which they find themselves.

Trusting country girl Marie Downey falls in love with touring stage-actor Clifford Dudley. As he becomes a matinee idol on Broadway, she turns a chorus girl.