"Kill the Indian and save the man" is the motto given by the founder of a school, in 1879, who believed that if he could erase the culture, religion and identity from Indian children, teaching them how to function in a "white man's world" they could become upstanding citizens of the United States. However, Kanton, a 16 year old Apache Indian, had other ideas. He vowed never to bend to the white man's world, even though to please his father he agreed to go to the school and at least learn to, read, write, and learn the English language. When he escapes the walls of the school and gets involved in an adventure to find the lost Apache gold mine in Arizona, he starts to discover that clinging to his convections is not as cut and dried as he believed it would be. He struggles with his own Indian pride, when he ends up falling in love with a white woman, whom he knows he can never marry because of the fact that he is an Indian and the woman he loves would be shunned by her own people, if she became his wife. Wanting to protect her from the shame of marrying an Indian, while loving her beyond reason, is a struggle that makes him question his own convictions, and what love is really all about.