The Idol of the Stage

Proud of his Knickerbocker descent, the Elder Van Kortland is ashamed of his son, Philip, for having adopted the stage for a profession. Although Philip is famous as a Broadway Star under the name of Edwin Hargrave, his father begs him to give up the stage and marry the daughter of an old friend. Hargrave refuses to give up his life-work or to marry a girl whose name he does not even know, much less a girl whom he has never seen. He departs on a western tour. While playing a week in a western city he meets and falls in love with Doris Morton, not knowing that she is the girl his father hoped he would marry. Her father, not knowing that Hargrave and Van Kortland are one and the same, tells Doris he would rather see her dead than married to an actor. Philip and Doris elope and are married. Philip and his wife go to Chicago, where he is booked to play several weeks. Here she falls ill, and the actor learns that long and careful nursing will he required to restore her health. He watches over her until his own health is wrecked from his stage work and sleepless nights nursing her. While building up his own constitution, he becomes a victim of narcotic drugs. Leaving Doris in charge of a nurse, Philip continues his tour. When this ends he accepts a position as leading man of a southern stock company to get money to pay the expenses of his wife's long illness. Marion, daughter of the manager, falls in love with him, not knowing that he is married. His mind clouded by a drug, Philip wanders into a Chinese Opium den masked as a curio shop. Here Marion follows him. Philip pretends he is buying a bracelet. This he gives her to allay suspicion, but later she finds him smoking in a back room. Trying to get the actor away from the den, she puts her diamond ring on his finger, coquettishly telling him it is in exchange for the bracelet. Finally curiosity overcomes her, and despite Philip's objection she tries opium smoking. Philip's senses are deadened by the drug and he does not know the effect it has on her until he awakens the next morning to find Marion in a nearby bunk. Realizing the situation, Hargrave resigns from the company as soon as he has safely led Marion from the opium den. Marlon sees the note to her father which says Hargrave, as he is known, must rejoin his wife in Chicago. Her love turns to hate. When Philip reaches Chicago Marion has him arrested for stealing her diamond ring. Mentally irresponsible because of his drug habit, Philip cannot make the fig