An unusual setting for a MacLean film - a Western on a train. I wonder if he wrote this after seeing/reading Murder on the Orient Express. It took me a while to get into this - all the characters blurred on a train, there was an old guy, another old guy, an outlaw, a sheriff, a girl (MacLean struggles to bring himself to have two girls). The action occasionally cuts away to other people meaning this feels like it was drafted originally as a screenplay or treatment.
I liked it once I knew what the mystery was - the outlaw is a detective, the dead person was his partner etc, the stakes are gold, the Indians. But it seems a bit too easy for his people. Early MacLeans the struggle is so hard - the elements are tough, it's brutal, they are constantly up against it. Here baddies are constantly getting the drop on heroes and then being rescued quickly by hidden guns/allies.
I did quite like the bantering relationship with hero had with the girl, Marcia. The fort and Indians are underused. It is decently paced and the setting is novel.
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