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Pat Sweeney, who has recently joined his parents, Gracie and Terry, in their travelling act, does a tap dance at a one-cent children's theater and later mischievously shoots his bean blower at the Marvelo brothers, destroying their acrobatic formation. The next day, the Sweeneys' boss, Mr. Freeman, fires them after receiving complaints that Pat should be in school. Bill, their agent, informs Terry that he cannot book the couple without the child, and Terry then decides to enter the reluctant Pat in a competition for a new child star in the style of Shirley Temple despite his declaration that he "ain't gonna be a dame." After several dreadful auditions, Pat is hired by J. D. Pemberton, whose financially strapped film company sponsored the contest, and dubbed the "Million Dollar Baby," due to the amount of insurance taken out on him. The Sweeneys are dispatched on a slow train to Hollywood, named the "Little Patricia Express," and they encounter publicity man Joe Lewis and Rita Ray, an old flame of Terry's, whose presence arouses Gracie's jealousy and leads to an estrangement between her and Terry. Meanwhile, Pat is up to his usual antics, and, at a stop in Kansas, he stars in a fashion show of dresses for little girls, and shocks the audience when he lets loose his pet mice. One evening, as Terry, Joe and Rita play cards and Gracie sleeps, the train makes a stop, and Pat uses the opportunity to run away. He soon meets a hobo named Jim, and they hide together in an abandoned farmhouse during a storm. Later, two cars drive up to the farm, one of which carries Mac, a wounded gangster boss. Mac's men send for a doctor and then discover Pat and Jim. When they learn that Pat is the "Million Dollar Baby," they decide to kidnap him. In the meantime, Terry, searching for Pat in an airplane, flies over the farmhouse and spots Pat writing his name on the roof with the doctor's bandages. Jim, Pat and the doctor manage to escape in one of the gangster's cars, and they are pursued into a barn, where they evade the crooks and then lock them inside shortly before the police arrive. After the Sweeneys' receive a $5,000 reward for their part in the mobsters' apprehension, Pat decides that they are now rich enough for him to admit on national radio that he is not a girl, and Joe declares that Pat's announcement will not prevent him from becoming a star, but will just be more good publicity.
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