Young, handsome and rugged Boyd Emerson (Joel McCrea) is a washed-up gold miner, dogsledding aimlessly through Alaska with scant luck and little hope for the future until he meets Cherry Mallotte (Evelyn Brent). Cherry is an attractive woman with enough worldly knowledge and business contacts to help the young man succeed in business. She is also a woman with a dubious past, much of it kept secret. Soon, young Emerson finds himself torn between two women: Cherry, his Alaskan mentor and inspiration, and the girl back home, Mildred Wayland (Jean Arthur), the high-society debutante he was planning to wed. As he tries to sort out his romantic conflict, a powerful salmon syndicate violently attempts to force him out of the fishing business.
