In The Clouds

Jesse McKinley: ON SADDLEBACK MOUNTAIN, Calif. — Walk into Mike Gates's summer home here and the first thing you notice — the only thing you could possibly notice — is the view.

With a wraparound vista broken only by the occasional hummingbird, Mr. Gates has 25-mile visibility on a decent day and more than twice that on a superlative one. The sunrises are pretty enough to make the cold worthwhile, and the sunsets would make a vampire sad to see the day go.

But Mr. Gates doesn't really come to the top of Saddleback Mountain — at the corner of 6,698 feet and the middle of nowhere — to look at the horizon or the hummingbirds, at the sunrise or the sunset.

He comes to look for smoke.