A timid young man is forced to follow in his father's footsteps as a notorious masked bandit.

In 1830, when California was a colony of Spain, Chico, an innkeeper and former cohort of the fugitive outlaw known as the Kissing Bandit, learns that the bandit's son Ricardo will be visiting from Boston. In a letter to Chico, Ricardo has written that he has been attending college and intends to help Chico with his "business," but Chico misinterprets the letter and believes that the young man is coming to help him return to banditry. Chico and many of his pals eagerly await the arrival of Ricardo, whom they expect will be as brave and cunning as his father, but their excitement soon turns to disappointment when Ricardo approaches them too quickly, loses control of his horse and crashes through the window of Chico's inn. Ricardo, who knows nothing of his father's criminal legacy and has been told that Chico was a former associate of his father's, faints when Chico tells him the truth. Ricardo balks at Chico's expectation that he will become the new bandit chief, and instead insists that he has come to California to help Chico operate his inn. Determined to make a bandit leader out of Ricardo, Chico disregards Ricardo's objections and dresses the young man in his father's clothes. Although Ricardo proves that he is worthless as a holdup man during the first attempt to lead a stagecoach robbery, the other bandits decide to keep him in the gang and use him to distract the women they are robbing with kisses. During the robbery of a stagecoach carrying Teresa, the daughter of Governor Don Jose, Ricardo, stricken by the young woman's beauty, is unable to leave her with a cheap kiss. Teresa returns home dejected, and mistakenly concludes that she was not kissed because the bandit found her unattractive. In love with Teresa, Ricardo later serenades her, but as soon as he finishes singing, he is shot at by Don Jose's guards and forced to flee. Don Jose, who believes that the Kissing Bandit insulted his daughter by refusing to kiss her, orders the arrest of the young trespasser and sends Colonel Gomez to find him. Later, Spanish tax collectors Count Ricardo Belmonte and General Felipe Torro, who are en route to the governor's hacienda, rent a room at Chico's inn. When Belmonte catches Chico stealing money from the sleeping Torro, a fistfight ensues. After subduing Belmonte and tying both tax collectors to their beds, Chico and Ricardo discover that the men are important officials and that they are carrying a letter of introduction to Don Jose. Ricardo and Chico steal the letter and disguise themselves as the tax collectors to gain entry to the governor's hacienda. At Don Jose's hacienda, Ricardo resumes his romantic pursuit of Teresa, and Chico begins romancing Isabella, the governor's sister. While Chico and Ricardo continue to deceive the governor at a fiesta held in honor of the visiting tax collectors, the real tax collectors escape from Chico's inn and make their way to the governor's. By the time they arrive there, however, Chico and Ricardo have revealed their true identities to Don Jose and have won his friendship. After sending Torro and Belmonte back to Spain, the governor asks Ricardo to stay at the hacienda and gives his blessing to their romance.