Safecracker Richard Mannion is released from prison after serving three years. He plans to go straight, but three of his former gang members, Charlie, Pop and Mack, threaten to kill him if he doesn't help them rob a bank in the town of Ranville. At the bank, Dick refuses to open the safe. The nightwatchman shines a flashlight on them, and Charlie, who was about to shoot Dick, kills the nightwatchman and knocks Dick cold with his revolver. He then puts the gun into Dick's hand and leaves with Pop and Mack. As Dick is being led away by the police, Charlie shoots at him, but misses and wounds an officer. Dick escapes, then jumps a train and gets off at another small town, where he attempts to rob the cash register at a restaurant. The waitress, Irene Howard, recognizes that Dick's concealed weapon is only a monkey wrench and offers him a meal in exchange for it, then gets her boss Tom to hire Dick as a dishwasher. Two months later, as Dick and Irene cry while peeling onions, they confess their love for each other. Later, when Dick breaks a dish, Tom, drunken and jealous of Irene's affection for Dick, fires him. When Tom starts to grab Irene, Dick fights him. Irene quits, and although Dick tells her that she better go without him, she vows to remain with him. After they are unable to get a ride hitchhiking, they find a broken-down truck belonging to Tex Shapiro, a Jewish peddler. Dick fixes the engine, and Tex gives them a ride to an auto camp, where Irene and Dick demonstrate better sales techniques than Tex. At night, Tex convinces Dick to propose to Irene, but Dick changes his mind and tells her that it would be best if he continued on alone. Tex interrupts them, and when he asks if he has proposed yet, Irene takes the initiative and accepts. Before the marriage ceremony, Irene sees Dick's picture on a "wanted for murder" poster. She marries Dick anyway and later says she doesn't care what he did, but insists that he does not lie to her. Dick explains how he got mixed up with Charlie, Pop and Mack and what happened at the bank. Soon, Dick and Irene travel as Tex's partners. When Irene has a baby girl, Tex learns that Dick is wanted by the police, and after Dick explains his past, Tex, who is convinced that the Ranville chief of police will treat Dick fairly, drives them to Ranville, where Dick is arrested. Tex conceives of a plan whereby Irene will go to San Francisco and get a job at the restaurant that Charlie, Pop and Mack frequent. A month later, after she repeatedly spurns Charlie's flirtations, Irene agrees to go in with the gang to rob Tex, who is posing as a dealer of Oriental art, of $50,000 locked in a warehouse vault. The gang then reads that Dick has escaped from jail, and when Dick locates them, they agree to cut Dick in if he opens the vault. Charlie, however, plans to kill Dick and escape with Irene and all the money. At the warehouse, after Dick opens the vault, he pulls a gun on Charlie and demands his cut. Charlie admits that he killed the watchman, and police, waiting to hear this confession, close in and apprehend the gang after a gunfight. The chief of police says that he will recommend leniency for Dick, and afterward, Dick, Irene, Tex and the baby continue their travels in their truck.