Magdalena might have been thought the happiest girl in the world. Born into a family of great wealth, she has an ambitious but kindly father, Don Roberto Yorba, and a mother of New England extraction who manages the household in a practical and restrained manner. Yet she has been a quiet girl from the moment of her birth, when she was thought born dead; and her mixture of Spanish and New England blood gives her both looks and character she thinks outshined in every way by her vivacious and constant friend, Helena, from another of California's wealthiest families. And while a fortune has been made, Fortune does not always smile upon the Yorba house: so that as Magdalena moves into womanhood, the difficulties she must face are ones she must master with her own inner resources.