The story opens with Mr. Ryder, a light-skinned black man born free before the Civil War, planning a society ball. He is the head of the Blue Veins Society, a club for educated and cultured black people who all, interestingly enough, tend to have very light skin (hence their name, for with light enough skin their blue veins are visible beneath).
As he has done well for himself, Mr. Ryder has been pursued by many women throughout his life, but he had not considered marriage until a light-skinned and aristocratic young woman named Molly Dixon made an appearance. It is in her honor and with the intention of proposing to her that Mr. Ryder plans the next Blue Veins ball.
When he is preparing his speech, Mr. Ryder receives an unexpected visitor. Liza Jane, an older black woman, comes to ask for help because she has heard that he is a pillar of the local black community. She tells Mr. Ryder that she was a slave and married a younger man named Sam, who was free, before the Civil War. However, he was to be sold into slavery regardless of his status, and she helped him escape. Sam promised to come back for her, but Liza Jane was sold to a different family. Liza Jane spent the next twenty-five years after the war looking for Sam, never once deviating in her love or fidelity to him.
In response to Liza Jane’s story, Mr. Ryder suggests that Sam could have remarried (as the slave marriages conducted before the Civil War were not considered binding), died, or have a number of other reasons for not seeking her out or for not wanting her to seek him out. Liza Jane asserts that she is certain that her husband has remained faithful and that she will not stop looking for him. She leaves Mr. Ryder with a picture of Sam when he was young.
At the ball, when Mr. Ryder is supposed to give his speech, he recounts the story of Liza Jane to the guests. Afterwards he asks the audience whether they think that the man in the story should have acknowledged the woman he had outgrown as his wife. All Mr. Ryder’s guests including Molly Dixon agree that the man should acknowledge his wife, upon which he leaves the room. After a moment he returns with Liza Jane and introduces her as “the wife of his youth.”
