Lilly Turner

Seduced by a carnival magician, Lilly Turner (Ruth Chatterton) marries him and soon after becomes pregnant. Her happiness is short lived though, because her husband’s legal wife shows up and forces him to abandon Lilly and their unborn child. Worried about her future, Lilly agrees to marry her friend Dave Dixon (Frank McHugh) and they hit the road as part of a carnival sideshow. When the baby dies, Lilly stays with Dave, despite his drinking, dulling her own pain with a series of lovers. When she meets taxi driver Bob Chandler (George Brent), an unemployed engineer, she is immediately taken with him and convinces him to join the sideshow as a strongman. Bob returns her affections and together they decide to leave the sideshow and move to Mexico where Bob has secured a job as an engineer. But when a deranged man from Lilly’s past returns to the carnival, a tragedy occurs forcing Lilly to make a decision that could end her relationship with Bob.