I traveled along slowly now, uncertain where to go or what to do. Meeting many who had seen me and Foot-and-a-half George on the road, I told them freely the story of his finish and my getaway. My prestige grew and I came to be accepted everywhere as “Stetson,” which, in the language of the road, means first class. Being young I naturally got puffed up and superior. I looked wise and mysterious, said nothing, and “connected” only with the higher-ups among the knights of the road. Stepping out on the street one morning at Great Falls, Montana, an icy wind out of the north reminded me that winter had come. I was almost broke, and fearing a Montana winter without money, I made a dash for the coast. I traveled north through Lethbridge, at the Canadian line, and into Calgary, Alberta; then west over the Canadian Pacific toward Vancouver, where I hoped to spend the winter. The snow had piled up in the Selkirk range, delaying trains for days and making life on the road uncertain and very unpleasant. My money had dwindled till buying a ticket was out of the question. Riding the rods of passenger trains meant freezing, and I was forced to take the slow and infrequent freights with their open box cars. At one of the larger towns in British Columbia I stopped off to rest up, get a decent night’s sleep, and thaw myself out. In the office of the hotel I went to stood a safe that attracted me. It was of a make that George always favored, and we had beaten a half dozen of them in the two years we were together. No explosives were needed. It could be got “on the quiet.” I put down my last dollar for a week’s board and room, and began planning an assault on the ancient “box.” I was alone, almost broke, and here was opportunity. Opportunity not only to fortify myself with money, but to test myself and prove whether my years with George and the Sanctimonious Kid had fitted me to make my way alone at the profession I had drifted into. I went over the situation carefully. A westbound passenger train passed through the town at one o’clock A.M. The hotel closed at midnight. An hour was time enough for the mechanical work on the box. The time-tables showed that I could be on the “American side” in twelve hours if I got out on the night train. Here was a feasible getaway. The next thing was to make sure that no one entered the hotel office between the hours of twelve and one. Several nights’ watching satisfied me that I would not be interrupted in that way. The week was almost gone, so was my money, and I saw that more would be needed for my board and lodging before the arrival of my first big night alone. This forced me into a small room burglary that was almost fatal.