Ben Quick is on trial for barn-burning, but with no evidence the judge orders him to leave town. He hitches a ride to Frenchman's Bend, Mississippi, with two young women in a convertible, Clara Varner and Eula Varner. Clara's father, Will Varner, is the domineering owner of most of the town, and he is away when Ben arrives. Will’s only son, Jody Varner, agrees to let Ben become a sharecropper on a vacant farm, setting the stage for a clash between old-world power and a self-made, ruthless drive.
When Will returns from a hospital stay, he is furious at Jody for hiring a notorious “barn burner,” but soon begins to see in Ben Quick a younger version of himself and comes to admire the very ruthlessness and ambition that Jody lacks. Will is also disappointed that his 23-year-old daughter, Clara, has not married the man she has been seeing for five or six years: Alan Stewart, a genteel Southern “blue blood” who seems more mama’s boy than match for the Varner name. Will therefore schemes to push his daughter and Ben together, even as Clara remains openly hostile to the crude upstart.
To sweeten the deal, Will offers to make Ben wealthy if he marries Clara. Meanwhile, Minnie Littlejohn, Will's longtime mistress, is dissatisfied with their arrangement and wants to get married, adding another thread to the tangled family politics that rule Frenchman’s Bend. Jody becomes increasingly frustrated, seeing his own position undermined, and his marriage falter as the maneuvering continues. After Ben sells some worthless wild horses for Will, he is rewarded with the job of clerk in Will's general store alongside Jody, and Will even invites him to live in the family mansion.
Tensions erupt when Jody pulls a gun on Ben and threatens to kill him. Ben talks his way out by spinning a tale about buried Civil War-era coins he has supposedly found on a property that Will gave him—a down payment to seal their bargain over Clara. Jody starts digging and finds a bag of coins; he is elated, thinking he has finally escaped his father's domination, and he buys the land from Ben. Late that night, Will finds his son still digging, and after examining a coin, he realizes it was minted in 1910. Jody is shattered by this discovery.
Ben aggressively pursues Clara, who eventually asks Alan Stewart what his intentions are, and he replies that he only wants to help her. Misinterpreting what Clara tells him, Will goes to congratulate Alan and his mother on the impending marriage, but is infuriated when he learns the truth. He returns home to a shaken mood, while a defeated Jody finds his father alone in their barn. Jody bolts the entrance and sets the barn on fire, but cannot go through with it and releases Will.
Men from town assume Ben Quick is the culprit and intend to lynch him, but Clara rescues him from the mob and drives him back to the plantation. Will defuses the situation by telling the mob he accidentally started the fire himself. Ben confesses to Clara that his father was a barn-burner, committing arson when offended, and that he has been falsely dogged by such accusations because of his father. He tells her he is leaving town, but Clara makes it clear she has fallen in love with him. Will, seeing the success of his scheme, is pleased and declares that he may live forever.
