Texas, shortly after the Civil War. Henry Moon is an outlaw, on the run from the law. He is captured trying to escape to Mexico and taken back to town to be hanged. The town has a special law that a condemned man can walk free if one of the single women of the town offer to marry him. Henry is in luck - at the last moment Julia Tate offers to marry him, and pretty soon they are married. However, Henry soon discovers that Julia's motives are purely business-orientated - she needs someone to work the mine on her property. This makes for a very cold marriage.