I decided, at this juncture, that I needed a drink. I ordered a Mirror Pond ale and then, luckily, found someone who could elucidate the rumors swirling around me. Bonnie Malone, 56, is a chiropractor/social activist who is arguably the dean of Sisters' liberal community. (The Chamber of Commerce named her "Citizen of the Year" for 2002.) "People here are scared of what's going to happen if House Bill 1904 passes," she said. "Timber companies have stolen from the woods near here before."

Malone noted that many Sisters residents still remember Layton and Bartlett, a Bend logging firm whose principals were, in 1990, found guilty of illegally cutting 1,800 trees -- federally protected old-growth -- about 10 miles south of Sisters. James W. Layton and Frederick W. Bartlett each drew 18 months in federal prison.

Now the loggers are "after our old-growth again," Malone said. "It's hard not to be skeptical of a forest plan that bypasses environmental review. Why do we have to cut these trees down so fast, without even considering the facts? Didn't we just rush into the Iraq war like that?"

Malone wore a denim jacket and peace symbol earrings, and as she leaned toward me and spoke, her manner was quiet, concerned. She took pains to convince me that Sisters was not split asunder by forest politics. "Most of my friends are Republicans," she said, and then she pointed me toward the most ardent among them.

John Zapel, 39, was reading a book on the aerospace industry when I met him the next day in the vinyl-upholstered booth of a Sisters restaurant called the Gallery. "I'm a nerd," he told me. "I'm the guy who carried a briefcase in high school." Pale-complected with sandy blond hair and glasses, Zapel ran a logging company until last year, when he sold his equipment and became, reluctantly, a logger for hire and a part-time lecturer on topics like "fuel load reduction" in dry forests.

"It was those guys who never take showers that drove me out of the business," he said. "Earth Liberation Front types. For 10 years, I got vandalized constantly. The last time they did $420,000 worth of damage to my harvester. They burnt it to a crisp and then they wrote all over the cab: 'Stop Killing Trees.'" Zapel showed me some pictures of the ruined machinery. "The lunatic fringe does exist," he said, "and that's the first place I'd look now. It's a good bet that these fires were set by ELF or some goofy thing like that. Consider their track record -- the apartment building they burned in San Diego, that ski lift at Vail."

I couldn't fathom why enviros would burn trees.

"The president's coming and they believe in disruption of process. They're saboteurs." Zapel stabbed a fork at his french fries. His right hand was missing two fingers, thanks to an ax. "Eugene is just two hours away," he reminded me, "and that's the premier bastion of the whole anarchist movement."

Eventually, Zapel and I stepped outside, onto the sidewalk. The smoky haze was still there, and the sight made him angry. "The most disgusting thing to me is that this didn't need to happen," he said. "We could've gone in there and thinned. We could've reduced the fuels on those forests. But now they're gone, and for the next 40 years we're staring at a Holocaust. That's sad for everybody." Back in Portland, I talked one last time with Joe Keating, of the Oregon Wildlife Federation, and his scout Russ Taylor. We met for morning coffee, and Taylor, a 50-something freelance photographer, showed up at the cafe wearing a white straw Stetson. In his arms, he bore an aerial photograph he'd taken of a forest ravaged by clear-cuts. "The pilot who flew me that day died a very mysterious death soon after the photo was taken," he said. "His plane crashed just after takeoff, and there were no mechanical problems."

"Russ," Keating implored in soothing tones, "Russ."

"Yeah, I'm one of those conspiracy theorists," Taylor continued, "and this goes real deep for me. It goes back to when a logging truck ran over my dog when I was 4. It goes back to when I was 8 and a bunch of redneck kids stole the hunting knife my father gave me as he was dying."

Keating had both elbows on the table now, and he was cradling his bald head in his hands, his brow wrinkled as he looked down at a newspaper. Here was a man trying to do something very old-school and American (it was Thomas Jefferson, remember, who championed "unremitting vigilance"), and yet he was finding himself mixed up with what he gently called "loose cannons and wing nuts." What on earth enabled him to soldier on?

Optimism and chipper resolve. "We want to get to the bottom of this quickly," he said, "before the trees are all gone, and I'll tell you, if that report comes out and it says the fires were not arson, then I'll scream and yell. Then I'll bring in the Sierra Club and all the other big groups and we'll say, 'This is exactly why we called for an independent investigation.' If they say it is arson, then I ask questions: 'Are you considering political arson? What is your time frame?' If the smell increases, I increase."

Keating grinned. "These fires are my favorite thing to talk about right now," he said, "but I gotta go." He tapped his newspaper, rolled now, against the table one time and then he stood up, a sturdy old guy in a T-shirt with a picture of an artichoke on it, and he strolled away down the street toward his office. His campaign to "shine the light of truth" on the planet's most powerful political figure was still on.

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