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While trying on an new pair of boots at the general store, Emmett Ryker hears shots and rushes into the street just in time to shoot two bank robbers. One of the robbers is still alive and Emmett recognizes him. He will not let any of the onlookers, including Trampas, send for a doctor until the wounded man tells him the name of a man he wants and where that man might be hiding. The wounded man says the man he seeks is named Charlie McMasters and that he is at Silver City. Emmett tells Sheriff Brannon (Harlan Wade) that two years before a rancher and his daughter were murdered by four men. Although unstated, the impression is left that the daughter and Emmett were more than just friends. He had managed to track down two of the killers and the third was the wounded robber in the street. He asks for leave to seek McMasters who was the fourth although the Sheriff cautions him against taking the law into his own hands.

Arriving in Silver City Emmett learns that McMasters was supposedly one of six men killed by the Sioux and buried at Cripple Creek. His query is overheard by another man, Cat McGraw (Harry Lauter). Leaving the saloon Emmett is grabbed by the local Sheriff, Goodbody (John Doucette), who was wired by Sheriff Brannon. Saying he does not want trouble, Goodbody locks up Emmett for the night. The next day he agrees to let Emmett go to Cripple Creek but only if he will take along a friend who also wants to go there and needs a guide. The friend turns out to be a young woman, Lucille Carver (Sheilah Wells), who came to find her father who had left her behind as a child but had recently sent her a letter saying he had struck it rich. By the time she arrived at Silver City, however, her father was reported as among those killed at Cripple Creek and she wants to visit his grave.

In the night the two are passed by Cat McGraw and another man who are trailing them. On reaching Cripple Creek they are attacked by the two men but they manage to kill one while McGraw rides off. It is clear to Emmett that the men were trying to kill the woman and not him. They find six graves and this corresponds to the six men supposedly working the claim at the site. They ride on to Fort Shields to find out about the Cripple Creek victims. There Emmett learns that only five of the dead at Cripple Creek were white, the other being a Sioux. He also learns that the day after the killings, a harried man came to the Fort with a packhorse burdened with bags of gold dust who headed off to Deadwood. All the time Emmett is observed and his plans overheard by Cat McGraw who specifically hears Lucille tell him she was so young she would not recognize her father. McGraw sends a telegram to Deadwood.

Leaving Lucille behind Emmett heads to Deadwood but is overtaken by Sheriff Goodbody. Goodbody reveals that he is on the trail of $50,000 in gold dust stolen in a robbery, that he had heard McMasters was involved, and that he expects the gold strike spoken of by Lucille's father was simply a ruse to explain the origin of the stolen gold dust. In Deadwood they learn a John Carver runs a mine and as they watch they see Lucille Carver arrive on the stage and go to Carver's mine. Emmett visits the mine and finds Lucille was telegrammed at the Fort by, and has reconciled with, her father, John (Paul Birch). We also learn that Cat McGraw is a confederate of John Carver. Later Emmett hints to Lucille that the man may not be her father. He is visited by John Carver whom Lucille has told of Emmett's doubts. He invites Emmett to come to the mine the next morning to see papers which will prove his identity although it is revealed he is planning to do away with Emmett when he arrives.

However, Emmett and Goodbody go to the mine at night and find it is not being worked and also discover that inside it are the hauls from several gold robberies – the mine is a ruse to explain the gold's origin. Their presence in the mine is discovered and they have a gun battle with Carver and McGraw which results in both the felons being killed. Nonetheless, before he dies, Carver reveals he really is McMasters, that Carver was simply one of his band of robbers and that he had tried to have Lucille killed until he realized she could not recognize her father. Lucille Carver arrives and weeps over the body and no one tells her it was not her father. Before Emmett leaves Deadwood, Goodbody learns that Emmett has given his share of the reward for the robberies anonymously to Lucille, she being told it was her father's share of the mine.