A poor widow dies, leaving her two young children, Bob and Mabel, in the care of a poor neighbor, who later is forced by circumstances to give them to an asylum. Twenty years pass and Jack, who has been adopted by a good family, has now gone into business for himself and is a rising young broker. He has been searching the detective agencies for his sister, without success, for some years. Mabel ran away from the asylum and has been brought up by a poor family, is without education and is now employed as a servant, and on a certain day is hanging clothes on a roof nearby a large office building, in which Bob has his office, and a small boy is flying his kite from the same rooftop.

May and Annie work in a fashionable millinery store, where the buyer, struck by May's beauty, advances her to a position among the models. She gets a little money, but finds that she is obliged to wear better clothes, which she has a hard time getting.