As America recovers from the American Civil War, Paul Cable (Tom Selleck) returns home to Texas after being away from his family for years while fighting for the Confederate Army. His wife, Martha (Suzy Amis), is a pretty but strong-willed frontier woman, whose independence makes her a force in and of herself. She had been told that he was killed in action. Upon her husband's unexpected return, she once again devotes herself to being his wife, but resents him for having left her and their children behind to fight a war she didn't care to understand.