It is 1849 and life has come to a standstill for Bruce Harkness, younger son of a Carolina planter. His father's plantation can no longer support him; Jo Peterson, the woman he loved, has married another man. And so Bruce decides to set sail for California, only to discover, just as he is about to embark, that Jo loves him still though hopelessly bound to her husband. Aboard the clipper-ship, Bruce has the good fortune to meet Hailey Burke, a fellow-Southerner who is destined to become his lifelong friend. But because Bruce defends a tiny Mexican boy, he makes an enemy of Rufus King, a ruthless Yankee gambler. In California, Bruce finds himself in a world of utter lawlessness, a land swarming with misfits and dreamers, with men driven mad by hardship and by the scarcity of women. But here Bruce's life takes a new turn when he meets the lovely Juana, wife of reckless Pepe de Cordoba, who becomes Bruce's companion and confidant.