Patricia Prentiss grows up in a mansion as the privileged daughter to an old-fashioned father who believes in church and public school, though his more progressive wife challenges him on both traditions. So, Patricia develops both a love of God and for a boy who is beneath her parents' notice. After school and during college, Patricia loses contact with dear John Worth, but when her parents announce that she should wed the spoiled bully Thornton Bellingham, she begins to desperately pray that John will reenter her crumbling life.