When tough-talking tenement teen Chuck Brennan (Jackie Cooper) falls in love with a beautiful and intelligent girl (Maureen O'Connor) who spends most of her time taking care of her ailing mother, he takes a job as an assistant to powerful gangster Blackie Davis (Matty Fain) to help make her life a little better. But the deeper Chuck sinks into the dizzying world of crime, the closer he gets to mortal danger.