Marian Skinner

After a brief view of Edgar Allan Poe's family background, his grandfather, David Poe, Sr., an Irish immigrant to America, and his father, David Poe, Jr., the poet's life is depicted from the death of his mother and his subsequent adoption by John Allan, to his own tortured death in 1849. Expelled from the University of Virginia for incurring too many debts, Poe nonetheless courts and marries Virginia Clemm but is disowned by his foster father. While residing in Fordham, New York, Poe tries to earn a living as a writer but meets with little financial success. Overwhelmed by their impoverished state, Virginia dies and Poe sinks into a profound depression. Always a victim of alcohol and subject to hallucinations, Poe first imagines that his neighbor, Helen Whitman, is Virginia, then plunges himself into an elaborate delusion in which his wife's spirit, various other spectres and a raven finally drive him to his own death.

When a couple of scammers hold young Alice Faulkner against her will to discover the whereabouts of letters whose dissemination could cause a scandal affecting the royal family, Sherlock Holmes decides to take over the case. (Considered lost, a copy was found in 2014, in the vaults of the Cinémathèque Française.)

Skinner is too timid to ask his boss for a salary increase, but also too timid to tell his wife he has not gotten it. He pretends to have received the raise and buys a new suit as proof. The stylish suit gives him confidence, soon he has been transformed into the dynamic and successful man he had pretended to be.

When an underworld figure inherits a fortune, he goes straight and endeavors to become a respectable businessman. But on a trip to Paris, he encounters a few not-so-honest types who think he is ripe for picking.

Daphne Trowbridge, an impulsive and obstinate but nonetheless kindhearted young woman, lives with her aunt and uncle on their country estate. Daphne falls in love with Tom Dunstan, but when she learns that Mrs. Trowbridge favors the young man, she deserts him, whereupon he departs for the woods brokenhearted. Because her aunt dislikes Gerald, Daphne accepts his proposal, but on the day of the wedding, she discovers that Mrs. Trowbridge has liked him from the beginning. Furious at her aunt's scheming, Daphne hires the first man she meets, who happens to be a heavily bearded lumberman, to marry her and then leave. Later, however, her hired husband abducts her to his cabin in the woods, where he eventually succeeds in taming her. After he rescues her from two lecherous lumberjacks, Daphne discovers that her husband is Tom, whom she had loved all along.

When noted scientist John Vandam dies in the Orient, he leaves the guardianship of his eighteen-year-old daughter to his old friend Sandy Verrall. Sandy believes that Eliza is a little girl and so prepares for the arrival of a child. Displeased with the situation, Eliza decides to dress and act like a kid so that Sandy will tire of her and send her away.

While attending college in Washington, D.C., Yuki Onda, the daughter of a Japanese samurai, meets and falls in love with Pierre Le Beau, a diplomatic attaché. At the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War, Pierre is sent to Japan as attaché to the Australian ambassador. When Yuki's father discovers his daughter's romance with a foreigner, he becomes enraged and betroths her to Prince Hagane for political reasons.

Princess Triloff, an emigrée from Czarist Russia, escapes to America where she becomes a patron of the arts. She falls in love with the verses of impoverished poet Owen Carey and becomes his anonymous benefactor. When Owen inherits a fortune from his rich Uncle Krakerfeller, he assumes his uncle's identity and confers his own upon an impoverished friend, Frank Manners. At a resort, Owen meets the princess and falls in love with her, but is chagrined to discover that she is enamored with Manners. The princess finally discovers Owen's real identity and the two fall in love.