Mobster "Baby Face" Martin (Humphrey Bogart) returns home to visit to the New York neighborhood where he grew up, dropping in on his mother (Marrjorie Main), who rejects him because of his gangster lifestyle, and his old girlfriend, Francey (Claire Trevor), now a syphilitic prostitute. Martin also crosses paths with Dave (Joel McCrea), a childhood friend struggling to make it as an architect, and the Dead End Kids, a gang of young boys roaming the streets of the city's East Side slums.