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When German immigrants Franz (Walter Janovitz) and Eva (Virginia Christine) Oster's daughter Lisa (Hannie Landman) is killed by Dracula (John Carradine), the Osters swear to fight this vampire, but no one will believe them. Dracula shows up again in the guise of Uncle James Underhill, newly arrived in town to help out at the Double Bar B Ranch. Dracula has assumed this identity because he is smitten with Elizabeth "Betty" Bentley (Melinda Casey), niece of the real James Underhill. Fortunately, Betty's boyfriend is retired gunslinger, now Double Bar B ranch hand, William Bonney, better known as Billy the Kid (Chuck Courtney). Billy gets suspicious of the gruff and heartless Underhill and invites the Osters to move onto the ranch to help Betty with the housekeeping chores. However, "Uncle James" fires Billy and drives the Osters out to the bunkhouse while planning to make Betty his vampire bride.

The movie was filmed from a screenplay written by American screenwriter Carl. K. Hittleman. The character of Dracula (who impersonates Uncle James Underhill in the movie) is taken from the 1897 novel Dracula by Irish author Bram Stoker. The character of Billy the Kid was taken from a real19th-century American outlaw who, according to legend, killed 21 men during his days as an outlaw, one for each year of his life, though he likely killed far fewer than that number.

After seeing that Uncle James casts no reflection in a mirror, convincing proof that he is a vampire, Doc Hull (Olive Carey) helps Billy break out of jail. Billy hurries back to the ranch but finds that both Underhill and Betty are missing. Concluding that Underhill must have taken Betty to the abandoned silver mine, Billy heads there. Meanwhile, Underhill/Dracula is putting Betty to sleep while preparing to bite her and make her his vampire bride. Billy arrives in time to fire seven bullets (from his six-shooter), but Dracula is not fazed and simply knocks Billy out cold. The Doc and Sheriff Griffin (Roy Barcroft) arrive just as Underhill zooms in on Betty for a final neck bite, and the sheriff shoots Dracula several more times but to no avail. Billy, now conscious again, grabs the sheriff's gun and tosses it at Dracula, hitting him in the head and knocking him out cold. He then takes the Doc's scalpel and hammers it into Dracula's heart. As Dracula begins to deteriorate, Betty wakes up, none the worse for the wear. In the final scene, Billy carries Betty out of the cave, stopping on the way for a long kiss, while Doc and the sheriff follow.

When Billy impales Dracula at the end of the movie, a bat is seen exiting the cave. It settles on the desert floor and is not referred to again, giving no explanation as to the significance of the scene. Viewers have suggested several possibilities: (1) it is Dracula's spirit leaving him, (2) it is an actual bat from the cave, (3) it suggests that Dracula's spirit survives in the bat, and (4) it was an attempt to set things up for a sequel that never materialized.

Surprisingly, it's more faithful to Bram Stoker's depiction of Dracula than most subsequent interpretations. In this movie, Uncle James/Dracula has a mustache, he speaks fluent English without an accent, he's not harmed by sunlight (although his powers may be diminished in the daytime), and he becomes enamored with another man's fiancée after first seeing her in a photograph.