Based on the short, but cautionary tale of greed and power from Stephen Vincent Benét, this story begins in 1840 in New Hampshire. A young farmer named Jabez Stone is one of the debt-ridden, impoverished farmers faced with the grim prospect of needing to pay off a mortgage, but with nothing to pay it with. He is plagued with unending bad luck, until finally, at the end of his tether he swears 'it's enough to make a man want to sell his soul to the devil!' And needless to say, if you speak of the devil, he doth appear...