“One night he went to the cabin of a white man. He shot him through the window as he stood in the light. He saw him fall; he sang his war-song and danced; he painted his face and started on the warpath; he was ready to die. “He made his wives take down their tepee and they fled to the mountains. From a cliff he saw the Mounted Police who had come to take him. He escaped with both his wives and they hid in the forest. They went north along the mountains. Whenever they got hungry, Opiowan took all the food he wanted from Indian camps. One night he stole into a white settlement near the foot of the mountains. He shot a white man and took all the ammunition he could get. The police followed his trail, but he escaped into the hills. “By this time it was the end of autumn, and winter came quickly with cold and deep snow. But Opiowan was always on the move. He had a way of shooting people through cabin windows, as they stood in the light. He was like a myth. He was said to be in many places at the same time, and to travel miraculous distances. “But, one night a heavy snow fell in the mountains and his wives left him. They fled to an Indian camp on the plains. Then Opiowan was driven from the mountains by cold and hunger. He came to the tepee of his brother in the Blood camp. His brother took him in and tried to hide him. But the Mounted Police trailed the murderer and surrounded the camp. Then Opiowan the Mad Indian killed himself. He cut his wrists with an awl and bled to death; and that is the end of my story.” Not till then was the feeling of dread removed from the people both Indian and white who lived near the border-line, on the lonely prairies and in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. The tales about him may have been exaggerated but the story of the Mounted Policeman proved that the Mad Indian was not a myth. CHAPTER XX COMING OF THE CHINOOK After many days the scout came back alone to his ranch, and we rode together on the open plains to look for missing cattle. We found cows and calves dying without food or drink, and a young steer that had fallen through the ice, frozen in the river. We hauled it ashore with our lariats and, after dragging the carcass back to the cabin, skinned and butchered it; the way Indians used to cut up buffalo. We took out the tongue, short-ribs, boss-ribs, shoulders and hams, briskets and belly-pieces. There was no waste; we used the entrails for eating, saving the hide for tanning, also the brains and liver; the tissue was used for sinew.