The Jailbird (1920)

Shakespeare Clancy is a jailbird who walks out with a crowd of visitors about the time "Skeeter" Burns, the prison printer, is discharged. When Clancy is notified that a legacy awaits him in Dodson, the pair depart for the small Western town. Discovering that the bequest consists of a failing county newspaper and a plot of barren land, they decide to capitalize upon the land by selling the townspeople shares in a bogus oil well. Meanwhile, Clancy falls in love with Alice Whitney, the society editor of the paper. After Alice and her maiden aunt insist upon investing their savings in the well, Clancy and Skeeter decide that the time has come to leave town. They are about to make their getaway when they are stopped by a crowd of cheering citizens, ecstatic because the well has struck oil. Concluding that his destiny is to be an honest man, Clancy returns to jail to finish serving his term. Slipping into the crowd of visitors, he dons his prison clothes and resumes work as though nothing had happened.