The play proper begins by introducing the situation of the Pennyboy family. Pennyboy Junior, a spendthrift, and Pennyboy Senior, an usurer and miser, are competing for the hand of the plutocratic Lady Pecunia. The nomenclature is somewhat misleading: Pennyboy Senior and Junior are not father and son, but uncle and nephew. The missing member of this family triangle, their brother and father, is present through the play, though he is disguised as a street singer; Pennyboy Cantor, as he is known, has faked his death (like Flowerdale Senior in "The London Prodigal") to observe the conduct of his family.