Burning Gold

As he is about to strike oil, which would enable him to marry Caroline Long, Jim Thurston is abruptly fired because his boss, Brent Taylor, also has his eye on Caroline. Jim's buddy Calico quits in sympathy. Fred Rice asks Jim to join him on a speculation, and counting on its yield, he and Caroline marry. The well, named the Caroline No. 1, is about to fold when Caroline's spinster cousin Lena helps him out with a government bond. During this time, Taylor has used every means, including violence, to defeat Jim, and finally has the well dynamited. However, his plan backfires when the blast turns the well into a gusher. At last a millionaire, Jim leaves Dry Creek in order to live in high style in the big city, taking Caroline, Lena and Calico with him. One night Jim attracts the wrong kind of attention in a nightclub, and when Taylor shows up and makes a pass at Caroline, she tells Lena she wishes she were home. Jim later becomes drunk and invites everyone to a party at his house, then, when Caroline asks the guests to leave, he becomes violent, and knocks down Calico when he tries to defend her. Caroline escapes to her room, broken-hearted at the change in Jim. The next morning, Jim awakens to find his bank account overdrawn by $7,600 and Caroline, Lena and Calico gone, having departed for Dry Creek while he was asleep. His remorse is interrupted by a telegram from Fred informing him that the well is on fire. At the well, Jim saves Calico, who has become trapped in an oil tank. With dynamite they stop the fire but destroy the well. Now broke, Jim turns down a lowly job from Taylor, whose taunts lead to a fight with Jim, which Jim wins. While Jim visits Calico in the hospital, the two friends are reconciled. When Caroline enters, Jim leaves the room, but Calico signals her, and she follows Jim. Finally Jim and Caroline kiss, forgetting the past.