Uncontrollable 16 year old Tabby McCallum (Joan Freeman) is chastised by the Virginian for shooting a shiloh steer. In retaliation she tries to burn down the Shiloh barn but is accidentally shot by a Shiloh hand, Sam Hicks (Charles Aidman). Tabby's brother Bruce McCallum (Carl Reindell), who is from the same mould as Tabby, claims she was deliberately shot while her father, Tucker (Charles Bickford), thinks her boy friend, Dan Flood (Bert Brinckerhof), started the fire. The result is a spiralling series of events which eventually lead to murder.