The scientist Janos Rukh has been expelled from the scientific community due to the lack of credibility in his researches. Living isolated in a castle with his blind mother and his wife Diane, he makes a private presentation of the recently discovered invisible ray to his colleague Dr. Felix Benet, and succeeds in being sponsored by Sir Francis Stevens and his wife Lady Arabella Stevens in an expedition to Nigeria, where he believe he could find a meteor with Radium X. Once in Africa, Janos leaves the expedition alone and finds the meteor, but is exposed to its radiation, acquiring a deadly touch that immediately kills anyone who is touched by him. Meanwhile, Diane falls in love for the son of Lady Arabella, Ronald Drake. Dr. Benet finds an antidote to control the effects of the radiation in Janos to be daily injected, but advises that the side effect could bring madness to him. Dr. Benet returns to Paris and steals the findings of Janos, exposing and using Janos's researches to the scientific community, while the deranged Janos seeks revenge against those that have betrayed him.