Diamond in the Rough. Diana Palmer

       Dear Reader

      It has been several years since I wrote two books dealing with a little town called Medicine Ridge in Montana. One of those books was CIRCLE OF GOLD, which was the story of Gil Callister and his daughters’ governess Kasie Mayfield, whom he later married. Gil had a brother, John, who featured largely in the book but whose story was never told.

      I was given the opportunity to revisit the Callisters and tell what happened to John. While my heart is still with the Long, Tall Texans of Jacobsville, Texas (and there will be many more stories about them in years to come), I do like those Men of Medicine Ridge in Montana. So John’s story may not be the last one I tell.

      I have spent many happy days roaming around Montana, and I can tell you that it has some of the nicest people on earth. It also has some of the most beautiful scenery anywhere. I hope that I’ve managed to capture some of the magic and elegance of this historic state in the books I write about it. If you’ve never been to Montana, it’s a great place to vacation. I can vouch for that!

      I hope you enjoy John Callister’s story. Thank you all for your years of loyalty, and your friendship.

      Love from your fan

       Diana Palmer

      DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH

      BY

      DIANA PALMER

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      For my friend Nancy C., who came all the way from Indiana just to meet me. Thanks for the beautiful cowboy quilt, Nancy—I’ll never forget you!

      And thanks to all of you on my bulletin board at my website, including Nancy and Amy, who spent hours of their precious free time making me a compendium of all the families in Jacobsville, Texas! Now, guys, maybe I can make fewer mistakes when I write about them! Love you all.

      CHAPTER ONE

      THE little town, Hollister, wasn’t much bigger than Medicine Ridge, Montana, where John Callister and his brother Gil had a huge ranch. But they’d decided that it wasn’t wise to confine their whole livelihood to one area. They needed to branch out a little, maybe try something different. On the main ranch, they ran a purebred bull and breeding operation with state-of-the-art science. John and Gil had decided to try something new here in Hollister, Montana; a ranch which would deal specifically in young purebred sale bulls, using the latest technology to breed for specific traits like low calving weight, lean conformation, and high weight gain ratio, among others. In addition, they were going to try new growth programs that combined specific organic grasses with mixed protein and grains to improve their production.

      In the depressed economy, tailor-made beef cattle would cater to the discerning organic beef consumer. Gil and John didn’t run beef cattle, but their champion bulls were bred to appeal to ranchers who did. It was a highly competitive field, especially with production costs going sky-high. Cattlemen could no longer depend on random breeding programs left up to nature. These days, progeny resulted from tailored genetics. It was a high-tech sort of agriculture. Gil and John had pioneered some of the newer computer-based programs that yielded high on profits coupled with less wasteful producer strategies.

      For example, Gil had heard about a program that used methane gas from cattle waste to produce energy to run ranch equipment. The initial expense for the hardware had been high, but it was already producing results. Much of the electricity used to light the barns and power the ranch equipment was due to the new technology. Any surplus energy could be sold back to the electric company. The brothers had also installed solar panels to heat water in the main house and run hydraulic equipment in the breeding barn and the stockyard. One of the larger agricultural magazines had featured an article about their latest innovations. Gil’s photo, and that of his daughters and his new wife had graced the pages of the trade publication. John had been at a cattle show and missed the photo shoot. He didn’t mind. He’d never been one to court publicity. Nor was Gil. But they wouldn’t miss a chance to advertise their genetically superior cattle.

      John usually traveled to show the cattle. But he was getting tired of spending his life on the road. Now that Gil had married Kasie, the brothers’ former secretary, and the small girls from Gil’s first marriage, Bess and Jenny, were in school, John was feeling lonelier than ever, and more restless. Not that he’d had a yen for Kasie, but Gil’s remarriage made him aware of the passing of time. He wasn’t getting any younger; he was in his thirties. The traveling was beginning to wear on him. Although he dated infrequently, he’d never found a woman he wanted to keep. He was also feeling like a fifth wheel at the family ranch.

      So he’d volunteered to come up to Hollister to rebuild this small, dilapidated cattle ranch that he and Gil had purchased and see if an injection of capital and new blood stock and high-tech innovation could bring it from bankruptcy to a higher status in the world of purebred cattle.

      The house, which John had only seen from aerial photos, was a wreck. No maintenance had been done on it for years by its elderly owner. He’d had to let most of his full-time cowboys go when the market fell, and he wasn’t able to keep up with the demands of the job with the part-timers he retained. Fences got broken, cattle escaped, the well went dry, the barn burned down and, finally, the owner decided to cut his losses. He’d offered the ranch for sale, as-is, and the Callister brothers had bought it from him. The old man had gone back East to live with a daughter.

      Now John had a firsthand look at the monumental task facing him. He’d have to hire new cowboys, build a barn as well as a stable, spend a few thousand making the house livable, sink a well, restring the fences, buy equipment, set up the methane-based power production plant… He groaned at the thought of it. The ranch in Medicine Ridge was state-of-the-art. This was medieval, by comparison. It was going