Anticipating a rich inheritance, Roger Courtney never thought that his uncle's fortune could go to someone else. It was all the more terrible for him to recognize in his rival Leona Dark, a peasant girl whom many years ago he had callously seduced and abandoned. Leona did not forget the insult and now, when her time has come, she fully enjoyed the troubles of her former “lover.” Hatred and contempt struck the heroes to the death, almost inadvertently destroying the real, sincere and passionate love of their children.