On a snowy winter night, Laurel and Hardy try to keep their pet dog Laughing Gravy hidden from their landlord, mostly without success.

Stan, clownishly drinks a glass of water and tries to return to sleep, only to wake the dog, whose barking rouses their landlord.

This basic scenario is repeated several times, resulting in Ollie falling into a frozen barrel of rainwater, locking himself out of the apartment window and climbing down and destroying the brick chimney.

The boys are to be evicted from the apartment when Stan receives a letter, along with a $1,000 check, informing him that he has inherited his uncle's fortune on the condition that he ceases all contact with Oliver.

There are also two "feature" versions in French and Spanish in which Laughing Gravy follows the events of Be Big!, and with a title card stating that Laurel and Hardy were divorced by their wives for what happened and wind up in the dingy rooming house.

In the three-reel version, Stanley receives a telegram just before they are evicted informing him that he is to inherit a vast fortune, but only if he leaves Ollie behind forever.

In the preceding Be Big!, Anita Garvin played Mrs. Laurel in all three films; she mouthed her foreign lines phonetically, on-camera but off-mic, while a voice actress just off-camera spoke into a "hot" mic.