When would-be train robbers discover that someone has betrayed the gang, young Jackson Evans finds he is trapped in a deadly snare: the gang leaders will kill him if he walks out because he knows too much, and an over-zealous sheriff will gun him down if he stays. The beautiful La Crosse River valley region, West Salem and Sparta, Wisconsin are the backdrops for this robbery-gone-bad episode set in 1885. A Black Hills outlaw who escaped the Pinkertons eight years earlier and has managed to stay clear from the long arm of the law, returns from hiding to a small Wisconsin community using an alias for cover. His scheme to rob a Chicago & North Western train heading to LaCrosse carrying $75,000 of payroll money for a logging company seems like a good plan. But a flaw in his well-laid design will challenge the gang's efforts.