A WW I veteran still haunted by his time in the trenches settles in a small town to work for the railroad company. His pretty wife attracts the attention of the lonely young gravedigger.
An older immigrant widower with a lonely, isolated life running a railroad water stop in the desert falls for a much younger beauty. After they marry, she resents his contentment with his life and his reluctance to spend his money, and starts trying to figure out how she can kill him.