Sunset Trail by Wayne D. Overholser

have showed it to you hours ago, but we were in a hurry to catch the train. I grabbed up several letters just as
     we left my office and didn’t look at them until we were on the train. Then it was like I said. I hoped to spare you this.”
    “Another crackpot,” Wyatt said with feigned indifference.
    “I don’t think so,” Henry said. “For one thing, we know that Amity is one of the centers of hostility to you. The second thing
     is that I’m guessing someone in Amity helped to make these plans and now he’s running scared and hoping it doesn’t happen.
     This was all he could think of doing.”
    Wyatt handed the envelope back to Henry. “You may be right. In any case, we’ll go ahead as planned.”
    “But damn it. . . .”
    The train had begun to slow. Wyatt made an impatient gesture. “Take our bags down, Tom. We’re right on time.”
    Henry, fully aware that Wyatt could be a very stubborn man at times, stepped into the aisle and took their valises from the
     rack just as the shrill, long drawn-out sound of the whistle came to them.
    “We’d better get out there on the platform,” Henry said, “and be ready to step off the minute the train stops or we’ll wind
     up in Kansas.”
    “The Populist vote in Kansas will not elect me in Colorado,” Wyatt said as he rose and moved into the aisle.
    He followed Henry to the end of the car, the bell clanging steadily as he went onto the platform and down the steps where he joined Henry.
    The conductor shouted-“B-o-a-r-d!”-and Wyatt saw the lanterns swing and the coach start to move. Am oment later smoke from
     the engine rolled in around them and the bell was sounding again. He remained there on the cinders beside the track until
     the train was far away, the rear lights growing smaller. The thought came to him that this would be an excellent spot to murder
     him while he stood in the thin light from the depot lamps.
    Wyatt took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. The night air was hot and without a trace of a breeze. He shrugged
     his shoulders, telling himself he had never been stampeded into panic by death threats. Still, as Henry had said, this was
     different. More than that, he was disappointed in Matt Dugan.
    He had never been in Burlington before; he did not know where the hotel was or how far it was from the depot. He had assumed
     that Dugan would have someone to meet them.
    “We’d better start walking,” Wyatt said. “I guess we can find a hotel.”
    “I have a rig to take you to the hotel,” a man said as he appeared around the corner of the depot.
    “Sorry I’m slow getting here. I got into a poker game and the last hand took longer’n I figured. Usually the train’s a few
     minutes late, but it was right on time tonight.”
    “I suppose a poker game’s more important than meeting the governor,” Henry said sulkily.
    “It’s all right, Mister . . . ?” Wyatt began.
    “Miles,” the man said. “Dick Miles. I work for Matt Dugan.”
    Wyatt caught the movement of the man’s hand in the thin light as he held it out. Wyatt shook it, then said: “Mister Miles,
     this is my secretary, Tom Henry.”
    “Howdy, Mister Henry,” Miles said, and offered his hand.
    Henry put the valises down and grunted something as he shook hands. Wyatt thought he would have to remind his secretary of
     his manners again. For some reason he always expected the red carpet treatment, which was seldom forthcoming.
    “This way,” Miles said, and led them around the depot to the hitch rail.
    Wyatt took the seat in the hack behind the driver’s. Henry dropped the valises in the back and sat down beside the governor.
    In less than five minutes they pulled up in front of a hotel, the lights in the lobby and those from a saloon across the street
     the only signs of life anywhere in the business block.
    “They’ll have breakfast for us at five,” Miles said. “We’ve got to leave here at least by six if we’re going to make it to
     Amity