Pasquale and Romaine are twin brothers. Romaine joins the Mexican Army and proves himself very efficient and fearless in the service of his country. He is promoted to a commission and stands high in the estimation of his superiors. Pasquale is a worthless ne’er-do-well, an outcast and a wanderer. His father will not permit him to abide in his home. He comes back and his mother sees him. She is in fear that his father will catch him and again throw him out. His mother, in fear and trembling, feeds him and furnishes him with money and implores him to leave the house before his father’s arrival. She sees his father coming and tells Pasquale to escape. He flees to the garret, but his father sees evidence of his having been there and abuses his wife for permitting their disreputable son to enter their abode. The mother tries to defend him, and the father, in anger, attempts to strike her. Romaine enters and throws his father aside: they draw daggers. The mother takes Romaine’s dagger from his hand and drops it upon the floor. Romaine then departs to the barracks, his father watching him from the window. Pasquale, thinking his father has gone, descends from the attic and picks up Romaine’s dagger. His father throws him outdoors. He wanders about and at nightfall meets his father, attacks him, and stabs him with Romaine’s dagger, to death. Anita, Romaine’s sweetheart, happens along at this moment and sees Pasquale crouching over the form of the dead man. She notifies the officers at the barracks and they immediately go to investigate. In the meantime, Romaine discovers his father’s dead body and is mournfully leaning over it when the officers come and arrest him. He is tried for murder, found guilty, and sentenced to be shot. Pasquale, in the meantime, goes out into the open country, but his conscience will not rest and he returns on the day of the execution of Romaine. He makes his way to the barracks, and looks with horror upon the dead body of his brother. He kneels in prayer, asking forgiveness for his sin. Anita enters and at once recognizes him as the murderer of his father. She stealthily withdraws and awaits his coming. As he is leaving the barracks, she kills him, avenging the death of her lover.