Sam and Jake have graduated from a correspondence detective school and are anxious to get to work. Both are in love with Helen, the sheriff's daughter, but the latter orders them to leave his daughter alone. While they are still at the house the sheriff gets a message from a widow living nearby that a burglar is in the house, and Sam and Jake both scent a field for action. The sheriff sets out to capture the crook, and the two detectives do the same. Meantime the crook has ransacked the place and the widow is cringing in terror in one of the rooms. When the sheriff arrives she does not recognize him in his makeup, and mistaking him for the crook, faints. The crook in an adjoining room is as frightened as is she. The widow revives and herself captures the crook whom Helen had taken into custody, but released when Jake and Sam appeared with the sheriff, whom they declared was the real burglar. The widow now marches the crook to the station, where the others are putting the sheriff through the third degree as per the instruction book. The sheriff removes his disguise and he and the widow decide that they can find happiness together, and so Helen wins a new mother.
—Moving Picture World synopsis