Human Desire (1919)

The orphan Bernice Stewart is raised almost to womanhood by the good sisters in an Italian convent Worshiping a picture of the Madonna and Child she is seized by a great desire to have a child she can call her own Running away to America where she has been told babies are plentiful she is taken in by Robert Bruce an artist whose wife has refused to divorce him and poses for his projected masterpiece a Madonna Bernice falls in love with the baby borrowed for this posing and is filled with sorrow when the child is taken away Robert who has become sincerely but honorably in love with the girl adopts a baby for her His wife meets Bernice and the baby believes the worst and insults her Bernice takes the child and leaves the house becoming lost in the city and finally finding refuge in a hospital where the child dies Robert learns from his wife the reason for Bernices departure locates the girl and after divorcing his wife marries her