"What shall we do? Where shall we go?" thought Jessie. The wind was blowing more and more clouds across the sky, and the lightning was very near.

She walked a little way into the woods, looking for a place to go out of the rain. Then she saw something ahead of her in the woods. It was an old box car...

Henry, Jessie, Violet and Benny, four orphaned brothers and sisters, suddenly appear in a small town. No one knows who these young wanderers are or where they have come from. Frightened to live with a grandfather they have never met, the children make a home for themselves in an abondoned red boxcar they discover in the woods. Henry, the oldest, goes to town to earn money and buy food and supplies.

Ambitious and resourceful, the plucky children make a happy life for themselves - until Violet gets too sick for her brothers and sister to care for her.