A man is sitting on the docks of a lake, thinking and watching the water. He is in town to get a job, but cannot find one. He sees a white excursion boat, and he thinks about how it must look in the spring when it goes across the lake to Crystal Beach, filled with people. The boat is called "Erie Queen." As he watches the boat, the man sees movement on it. A young man lifts the tarpaulin and comes out, cautiously looking around. The young man comes onto the docks, then goes across the street to the warehouses. He waits there until a girl comes. They kiss, and he hands her something from his pocket before they walk away. The man is curious about the couple and comes back to the docks again the next day. This time when the young man leaves the boat, he sees the other man on the docks. The young man is named Ed, and the man asks Ed about the ship. The girl comes up to Ed, and the man says hello to her. Ed asks her if she brought anything, and she says she could not. Ed explains to the man that the girl usually brings his lunch because he does not have any money. The man feels a sentimental attachment to the couple and takes them to get food. The girl reveals that her name is Veronica, and her father is the captain of the "Erie Queen." Her family are devout Catholics, and now that she is not in parish school she helps at home. Veronica and Ed met on the "Erie Queen," and Veronica's father lets Ed stay on the boat as long as the company does not find out. However, he complains about Ed living onboard and says that he will get off and stay off one of these days. Veronica goes home, and Ed and the man walk back to the docks. Ed reveals that Veronica wants to marry, but he does not want to because of all of the factors like him not having money and Veronica's parents. The man thinks that he is getting too involved in the lives of the couple, but he decides to go back to the docks the next day for one last time and then leave town. Veronica is on the docks looking panicked, and she asks the man desperately for news of Ed, who has vanished. She asks the man to look on the boat for Ed, but Ed is not there. The man says that Ed will come back, and Veronica starts crying and reveals that there had been an argument in her house about Ed. Her parents believed that if Veronica and Ed were in love, that meant that they must have lain together, and they made Veronica admit that she and Ed had been lovers. They had convinced Veronica that she must be pregnant, and she tells the man that she must marry Ed today. The man says that the only way Ed will marry her is if he knows she is pregnant, but she does not want to force it on him. Veronica asks the man to find Ed, and he says he will look. Veronica says to tell Ed to marry her, but not to reveal that she is pregnant. The man leaves her on the docks and goes to look. The man asks everyone in town that he knows, but nobody has seen Ed. He realizes that he has been gone for two hours, and he goes back to find Veronica, but she is gone. The man decides to go home that night, and he says goodbye to the "Erie Queen." He realizes he will never know if Ed and Veronica are together. He goes to the restaurant he took Veronica and Ed to, thinking Veronica might be waiting there for him, but she is not. The man decides to have a cup of coffee. All of a sudden, there are yells outside and fire engines race down the street. The man goes outside, and sees that the "Erie Queen" is burning. He asks someone in the crowd what happened, and is told that it was set on fire. The man sees Ed being held by two police officers and sobbing, and he pushes through the crowd to speak with him. Before Ed can say what happened, he is dragged away by the police officers. The man realizes that despite his involvement with Veronica and Ed, he knows nothing about what happened. He decides he has become too involved, and it is time to go back home to his own city. On the train, the man reads the paper. On the front is a picture of the "Erie Queen" burning, alongside pictures of Ed and Veronica. The man reads and discovers what happened. Ed had come back to the docks at 6 o'clock after finding a job and being at work all day. He felt like anything was now possible. He went onboard the "Erie Queen" and found the lunch Veronica had left for him. He smiled in gratitude, and leaned against the rails of the boat looking out to the water. Then, he looked down. Veronica was floating in the water with despair on her face. Ed got help and the ambulance came, but Veronica was dead. They took her away and police and reporters came, by which time the ship was burning. Ed was "shaking himself loose from her tyrannical hold."