'What about gambling? You a tinhorn?'
This time Longarm grinned at the question. 'I'll own up to enjoying a friendly game of poker, and I've bucked the tiger at faro a time or two. But I've never made a living with the pasteboards, nor had a hankering to.'
Traywick nodded. 'Don't mean no offense by askin' so many questions, Custis. It's just that I've been with Matt Kinsman for a long time, and I sort of look out after him. I reckon you understand.'
'Sure do,' Longarm assured the foreman. 'I'll be honest with you, Mr. Traywick, I'm the fiddle-footed sort. Spend most of my time drifting from place to place, just seeing what's on the other side of the hill. But whenever I light in a place, I give my boss an honest day's work for as long as I'm there. You got my word on that.'
'I'll take it,' Traywick said as he extended his hand. 'Welcome to the Diamond K, Custis. You'll be treated fair here.'
Longarm shook the man's hand, feeling the calluses that years of working with a rope had put there. Now that he had been accepted by the foreman, Longarm thought he might risk a question or two of his own.
'What's this about problems you've been having in these parts? Seems plumb peaceful to me.'
Traywick sighed and shook his head. 'That's because you just ain't been around here long enough. I swear, I'm afraid somebody's goin' to get killed 'fore it's all over.' Venom came into the man's voice, sounding odd because Longarm was already accustomed to Traywick's normally mild tone. 'And it's all the fault of those damned lumberjacks!'
'There's a logging outfit around here?' Longarm asked innocently.
'Three or four of 'em in this part of the Cascades alone.' Traywick jerked a thumb toward the timbered slopes of the mountain rising above the ranch. 'It's the bunch operatin' right up yonder that's causin' all the trouble, though. I'd stake my liver on it.'
'Bad blood between them and the Diamond K, huh?'
'It all started when we lost some cows to rustlers a while back,' said Traywick. 'Matt and I rode up there to that lumber camp to find out if maybe they'd seen or heard anybody movin' cattle durin' the night, and damned if they wasn't all sittin' around eatin' steaks!'
'You think lumberjacks rustled your beef?' That sounded pretty unlikely to Longarm. Those timbermen might know their way around a knife and a fork, but most of them weren't any good with steaks still on the hoof.
'I'm convinced of it. That woman who's runnin' the place claimed they hadn't seen any sign of anything suspicious.'
'What about the steaks?'
'Said they bought 'em in Timber City.'
'Well, I reckon that's possible,' said Longarm.
'Sure, but it's just as likely they stole those cows from us,' Traywick said stubbornly. 'Matt practically said as much, and that woman got her dander up and told us to get out. Matt told her that bein' a gentleman, he wouldn't call her a liar to her face--but it was plain that was what he thought of her.'
That agreed with what Aurora Mcentire had said... almost. She had left out any mention of steaks cooking and rustled beeves. Longarm said, 'I've heard tell that some of those logging outfits cut down so much timber that the runoff from the rains does a lot of damage to the range down below. That true in this case?'
'Well, not so much.' The admission on the foreman's part was grudging. 'I reckon it's just a matter of time, though. Sooner or later, so many of the trees'll be gone that none of the soil will hold. That'll cause flooding down here, and erosion will foul the streams too.' Traywick shook his head. 'No, sir, ranching and logging just don't go together.'
'Those loggers pulled any other tricks?'
'Less'n a week after Matt and me rode up there, one of our wells in a dry pasture went bad. Couple of dozen head died from drinking at the stock tank we filled from it. If you ask me, those lumberjacks poured poison down it.'
'But you can't prove that.'
Traywick looked at Longarm with slitted eyes. 'Say, what're you actin' so doubtful about? You intend to ride for the brand or not?'
'Sure, I do,' Longarm said quickly. 'I just like to know who's on the other side if I'm getting into a fight.'
'Well, now you know.' Traywick jerked his head toward the barn. 'Let's get these nags unsaddled and rubbed down. I'm tired of flappin' my jaw.' What he had said so far was interesting enough, thought Longarm. Matt Kinsman was hotheaded and held a grudge, and it was possible the friction between the Diamond K and the Mcentire Timber Company had started over a few rustled cows that the loggers hadn't really had anything to do with. Was Kinsman the sort to strike back at the timber operation and get some men killed just to satisfy a grudge? Longarm couldn't answer that question for certain, but his instincts said no. However, he didn't know all the men who rode for the Diamond K, and for that matter, he had already met one who flew off the handle and resorted to violence mighty quick. Seth Thomas. As Longarm unsaddled the roan, rubbed it down, and settled it in a stall with grain and water, he reflected on what he had learned so far. The loggers and the cowboys hated each other; whether for good reason or not didn't matter. He could easily imagine Seth and some of his cronies trying to strike back at the lumberjacks for imagined injustices, which would in turn lead the timbermen to try to get even by poisoning wells and such. It was a cycle of violence that could escalate into a bloody, full-scale war unless somebody tamped out the flames mighty soon. That somebody, of course, was him.
And his theory, if it was correct, still left unanswered the question of who had rustled Kinsman's stock in the first place.
Longarm was going to have to ponder on that later. As he and Traywick left the barn, the sound of the dinner bell being rung came from the ranch house. The sun had already slipped behind the peaks of the Cascades to the west.
Traywick led Longarm to the house. As they walked toward it, several other men appeared from various places around the headquarters, all converging on the big house in response to the clangorous summons of the cook ringing the bell. He was a wizened little Chinaman, Longarm noted, who had probably come to this country during
