A Child of the Prairie

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Tom Martin, a young rancher, has a wife and small child. Unknown to Tom, his wife has become infatuated with a gambler, who, during Tom's absence from home, calls on the wife and tries to persuade her to leave with him. She refuses, and the gambler plots to get rid of Tom. He hires a team of horses and a buggy and goes to the gambling room of the saloon. Under a table he places a revolver with the barrel through a hole, ties a string to the trigger and when Tom enters later, he is invited to play cards. The gambler forces a quarrel, and Tom starts to pull his revolver when the gambler pulls the string and Tom is shot from under the table. The gambler then goes to Tom's home, tells Tom's wife her husband has been killed and takes her and the little one away. In packing her household goods, Tom's wife drops a baby dress, and the gambler tears up and leaves behind unthinkingly, an old photograph of himself. In the hurried escape the baby wanders away and becomes lost, and as the gambler fears to remain and search for the child, he forces the woman into the buggy and drives away. Later, cowboys find the lost child. Tom recovers, goes to his home and finds the dress and the torn photograph of the gambler. He makes up his mind that someday he will find the despoiler of his home. Fifteen years later Tom is sheriff of the county and he receives a letter telling him to arrest the man whose picture is enclosed. He recognizes the photograph as that of the gambler. He starts out to find the man when he sees a young girl in a runaway team. He rides to the side of the onrushing wagon and at his command the girl jumps to his arms. He sees in her a resemblance to his lost baby and tells her of it. Later, Tom encounters the gambler in town. There is an exchange of shots, and the bullet from the gambler's revolver shatters a lamp just above Tom's head, while the bullet Tom fires reaches the mark. The dying crook tells Tom of how the child was lost, and so father and child are finally reunited.