The Blue Ribbon Brides Collection

by AlLee, Jennifer L. ; Breidenbach, Angela; Franklin, Darlene

  “We need to talk about a few things tonight.” Mr. Thomas tapped the table. “One thing is I want in on the partnership. Twenty-five percent.”

  “Twenty-five percent of a defunct company is nothing, sir.” Grant leaned his head toward Sarah. “I believe I’ll be helping on Sarah’s dairy farm for the foreseeable future.”

  “Not if I have anything to say about it.” Mr. Bentley’s determined face brooked no arguments. “Twenty-five percent for me, too.”

  Grant puffed out a sigh. “If you mean as investors—”

  His father raised a hand. “We have a deal that will sweeten the pot.”

  “Oh? I’m listening.” Grant raised his water glass to his lips and sipped.

  “We’ll donate to the funding of a new clinic in Northwoods, in honor of the winner of the quilting contest.”

  A thrill shot through Sarah. “Really?”

  “We have it on good authority that she wishes to improve the health care for residents of her community.”

  “Sounds like bribery to me,” Grant drawled.

  Sarah elbowed him. “Sounds like a winning proposition.”

  Grant drove Sarah back to her aunt’s farm in a daze. Father and Mr. Thomas were now his and Lee’s partners. Lee had already agreed to assume lead, and they’d pursue his motorized vehicle engine designs. Sarah had visibly relaxed when he’d shared that news.

  From the kitchen window, lights shone bright. Laughter echoed outside the small farmhouse. After parking the conveyance, they hurried inside.

  Seth had a mug of punch raised. “I toast the happy couple!”

  Bonnie and Frank hugged.

  Lee extended his arm toward the two. “I’m proud and privileged to give you Mr. and Mrs. Frank Bentley.”

  Lila bent and hugged her pet. “I got a new daddy, and you do, too, Mr. Box!”

  “What on earth?” Sarah clutched Grant’s hand.

  Joining them, with her dog trotting behind, Lila took Grant’s free hand. “I’m your cousin now, Mama says!”

  “If those two got married, then that’s true.”

  “They’re hitched, and we saw it!” Lee wrapped his arm around Denise, and she blushed.

  Mr. Box trotted off toward the farmhand. He licked Seth’s leg, where a piece of cake had clung.

  “Have some cake.” Bonnie wiped tears from her eyes and pointed to a white cake heavily frosted with her famous stove-top, prize-winning concoction. It would definitely not be served at the Kelloggs’ Health Reform Institute in Battle Creek.

  “Married?” Sarah blinked.

  Lee leaned in to whisper: “If the story the Detroit Free Press is fixin’ to run is right, they ain’t gonna be the only Mr. and Mrs. Bentley in the family.”

  “Nor the only blue ribbon bride.” Grant pulled Sarah into his arms and bestowed a lingering kiss.

  Author’s Notes

  The 1889 Michigan State Fair in Lansing was supposed to begin the use of a permanent site for the fair (which had rotated through other cities such as Grand Rapids and Detroit). A huge investment was put into making the grounds fabulous. Unfortunately, maintenance costs and other fiscal difficulties arose, and the fairgrounds were later sold to Oldsmobile.

  In this time period, balloonists really were referred to as professors, an honorary title, and as aeronauts. Many balloonists died as they engaged in more spectacular demonstrations, such as parachute descending. Ground assistants could be injured, especially the inexperienced. Those involved in ballooning were widely varied. Many were inventors—like my hero—or military—like my hero’s father (balloons were used during the Civil War). Additionally, aerial photographers, cartographers, and artists, as well as showmen and thrill seekers made use of balloons. Some weddings were really performed in balloons.

  Three main types of balloons are coal gas (less common and more stable for Michigan’s climate), hydrogen (highly flammable), and heated air. Helium came after this time period. The wind commonly shifted during landing, and this brought about the most mishaps. Sand was often used as ballast. To ascend, ballast had to be tossed off, and to descend, the upper flap of the balloon was opened, releasing the air. Upon descent, without a means to ascend again nor ballast to hold the balloon down, one way to control the balloon was by a drag rope. Imagine being a farmer in the field, as a struggling balloonist wildly gestures for you to grab some lines, which he throws down. You might be the only thing between the “professor” and yonder trees, preventing possible injury or death. Balloons were expensive and had to be recovered, if possible. Dirigibles were the next big thing after this era, and what my hero is working toward—a larger balloon with the capacity to be steered over long distances. Given the dangers of these huge dirigibles (remember the Hindenburg), I think my hero made the right choice, don’t you?

  Carrie Fancett Pagels, PhD, “Hearts Overcoming Through Time,” is an award-winning, multi-published, Christian historical romance author. Twenty-five years as a psychologist didn’t “cure” her overactive imagination. Although a “Yooper” by birth, and a Michigander, she currently resides with her family in Virginia. She’s a self-professed “history geek.” Carrie loves to read, bake, bead, and travel – but not all at the same time! You can find her on her website www.carriefancettpagels.com or on her two group blogs: OvercomingwithGod.com and ColonialQuills.org.

  There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: the way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid.

  PROVERBS 30:18–19

  Chapter 1

  May 1, 1893

  Bettina Gilbert gawked at the White City from a bench on the hurricane deck of the steamship as she balanced a sketchbook on one knee, a white lace glove in her lap to avoid blackening it with graphite smudges. The clouds clearing from their early morning drapery drew away as if a cord were pulled on a stage, revealing the glow of bright white classical structures gleaming in the spring sun. Heaven might as well be laid out before her. The Peristyle’s forty-eight Roman columns, one for each state, and its gateway arches spread the massive colonnade across the park’s waterway entrance butted by the mammoth casino on one side and the matching music hall on the other. From the distance, the shape made by the harbor buildings seemed more like Bettina pictured the Lord’s giant throne room, regal and triumphant, calling believers into His presence.

  Could she capture that sense of incredible royalty in a sketch before the boat docked? The cacophony of the crowd on board rumbled with unencumbered excitement to discover the Columbian Exposition of 1893. The noise of the crowd on the pier walkway rolled across the short distance to collide with the clamor on the boat as if one hand met the other in wild ovation. Did the angelic chorus sound as loud? God must have rather the regular headache. Bettina pressed lace-clad fingertips to her temple.

  “Beautiful from this vantage.” The expressive awe in the man’s words tickled her ears, a calm center in the explosion of buzzing energy. His voice soothed her spirit like the sun on her shoulders eased the shivers after the morning’s rainy start. “We’re blessed with unusual opportunity.”

  Against the rising roar from inland, where hundreds of thousands listened to President Cleveland’s opening address and those on the dock scurried to see the great man press the golden key to open the fair, this man’s quiet words subdued Bettina’s frayed nerves. “Yes, astonishingly so.” She slipped the sketch pencil into her hair and turned into the sun, barely escaped from its cloudy curtains, to find her fellow passenger.

  Lifting her gloved hand to block the glare, she caught a glimpse of a mustache and dark hair under a bowler as she waited out the signal bell clanging orders to the steamship’s crew. Then a woman with several well-dressed children, girls in matching gray frocks and boys in matching gray knickers and vests, jostled into an open space, hindering a good view of her congenial companion.

  He must have given way—as a gentleman should accor
ding to her father. Refreshing, since manners seemed sorely lacking as more and more travelers bore down on Chicago the last few weeks. Well, it’d been a pleasant interlude among the din. She returned to her sketching.

  “Antoine, qu’est-ce que je dis? Ton frère …”

  French. Bettina tried to ignore the poor mite’s scolding for shoving a sibling, but her love of language and sense of unrequited adventure meant a tiny bit of intentional eavesdropping. Poor bored Antoine was picking on his brother. She knew exactly what that felt like. Her pencil flew. The boy’s face, eyes full of longing, took over the upper corner of her page, watching the city from afar.

  Who were all these people? What were their home countries like? Why were they here, specifically? The magnitude of the crowds everywhere she looked already drained her people patience. She’d much prefer peeping into a microscope or testing soil samples. But then, she still had to find a way to meet the man she hoped would have a place for her to continue her research. Dr. Kelsey would be here, at the exposition, taking part in the congresses before massive audiences. She couldn’t arrive on that day and expect to be prepared. No, coming early to investigate was a wise choice.

  She cast a quick consolation glance at the boy who wanted to be done with the waiting. It had to be harder still for a small boy to wait when the World’s Fair seemed only inches away and as yet so inaccessible. Would anything be as thrilling for him again in his lifetime? Or hers? The boy turned to face away from his family, nose in the air as if watching a seagull. An elbow popped out and jabbed his little brother, setting off another squabble. Then he pretended a wide-eyed innocence as his sibling overreacted to the injury, sending his mama into another fit of French scolds.

  Oh no. Bettina rolled her lips inward and tightened them to keep from laughing. Anyone could tell what a finger-shaking at a nose meant. How many strangers had caught her brothers, or her, acting just this way during childhood? She focused on shading dimension into the numerous arches of the Peristyle rather than be an encouraging party to the French lad’s mischievous antics. French boys and Irish American boys. Not so different. Although she seemed to get away with a few pranks as the middle child to keep her four brothers in line, it was survival of the fittest as far as she was concerned. Adding an eight-year-old sister into the family meant jostling for a new pecking order.

  Bettina peeked back at the boy. “I see you,” she mouthed at him and signaled between their eyes in case he didn’t speak English.

  He rewarded her with a knowing grin.

  She tipped her pencil to her hat—ending the silent, secret language of mischievous middles.

  His grin grew.

  She’d take one-on-one communication any day over parties and crowds. Then she caught sight of another gaze. A little breath wedged in her throat at the handsome stranger’s nod of detection. He’d noticed the exchange and joined in the humorous moment. Bettina lowered her lashes and turned toward the dock, a warm blush creeping across her cheeks. She whispered to herself, “No distractions.” My, but she liked the confident look of him.

  Approaching the already teeming dock doubled the volume and drowned out her ability to think. Today national and international experts began to gather and share scientific discoveries and potential medicines derived from the study of plants. The upcoming congresses promised to educate and entertain on every topic imaginable. Winning a slot to present her own paper on strategic crop planting for maximum harvest both excited and terrified her. Only the possibility of gaining a position close to home at Oberlin College convinced her parents the summer in Chicago would be worth the sacrifice of letting their daughter go for a short time. But would anyone even want to hear an unknown, let alone a woman botanist, speak on farming techniques? Hopefully one Reverend Doctor F. D. Kelsey and his colleagues. She pushed the anxiety away and concentrated on her plan.

  Bettina knew where each one of the featured displays would be housed as well as the illustrious names in botanical science she wanted to meet. She’d gleaned several from research papers at college, and thanks to the detailed articles in the Chicago Tribune for the last year or so, she knew which would be speaking or participating with an exhibit. Sharing her work was less about the audience and more about attracting an expert mentor, preferably the good Reverend Doctor Kelsey, to help her navigate her budding botany career.

  The daily speakers in the congresses, where the learned of the world convened to educate and enlighten, held both the key to her future and an example of how she should conduct herself when it came her turn to present. While others took in the sights and exotic experiences like camel rides, Egyptian mummies, and Mr. Ferris’s wheel on the specially dubbed Street of Cairo, Bettina intended to expand her horizons professionally by studying the scholars she wished to intern under for an advanced degree. She didn’t have time for thrill seeking if the few remaining positions that fit her need for a situation near Cleveland, and her parents, were at stake.

  The signal bell clanged its arrival announcement. Closing the sketch pad, she eyed the jam of families, including the French lad still pestering his little brother. The mishmash line flowed out from the stairwell and disappeared down two decks toward departure. That could take awhile. A few minutes more to remember the awestruck moment the White City boardwalk spread like a welcome mat to every nation would be worth the delay disembarking after the mass exodus off the steamboat. But then she’d visit each botanical and agricultural exhibit first. Of all the places possible, admiring and studying the leading experts’ work at the World’s Fair had to be the best opportunity to find a master mentor for a degreed botanist.

  Bettina’s heart drummed in her ears, matching the thrum of the antsy throng. Brilliant minds would walk here this summer. She wanted the chance to meet them, discover unknown species, uses for plant materials, and better ways to manage crops to feed the masses—and one day be considered accomplished among those brilliant minds.

  She flipped open the page on her sketchbook again, tucking the loose referral letter from her professor safely in the back pages with her carefully planned list of activities, and tugged the pencil from its mooring under the small purple hat. Flaxen strands floated free of her loose chignon and danced in the breeze over her shoulders as she bent to draft a smart line drawing of her first view from Lake Michigan. She studied the entrancing architecture, ducked again to feather in a little shading for the lagoon, and then shifted on the bench for a better angle to finish the brilliant white, elegant casino left of the pier. The beaux art domes on many of the structures seemed similar. She started counting, dipping the end of the pencil as she ticked off each one in sight.

  “That’s an astounding representation,” the same man’s voice said as he leaned over her shoulder, blocking the morning sun.

  Bettina gasped and dropped her sketchbook. It slid down her navy skirt and lodged near her boot—until she moved to pick it up at the same time the ship’s paddle wheel chugged, jerking into reversed direction as it moored alongside the dock. Skittering across the planked decking, still wet from the earlier drizzle, the book careened toward the edge. She stood to give chase.

  He shot to the rescue, dropping to a knee and snagging the book by the corner before it slid under the boat’s rail and over the side. As he rose, the pages blew open and fluttered in the breeze, loosing one to float free, lolling on a current.

  Her reference letter! “Catch that!” She lurched, arm outstretched, and bumped the handsome stranger into the railing as they both reached for the paper. Her pencil sailed from her fingers and plunged into the waves. She scrambled for a handhold and clutched for the page, losing her balance. Her gloved hand slid at the same time as her boot, pitching her forward, off her feet, in the direction of water lapping against the hull.

  The man grasped Bettina around the waist a moment before she tumbled into Lake Michigan three decks below.

  She squeaked like a strangled seagull as his saving strength cut off all airflow.

  One arm tig
ht around Bettina, he snagged the errant page from the teasing grasp of the breeze as it blew inward and tipped toward the water, missing its pencil mate. Setting her back on her feet, he let her loose. “Are you all right?”

  Dragging in a deep breath, Bettina clasped the white lace at her throat. “Yes. I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t stopped me.” She swallowed as she glanced down at the deep, dark water. “Thank you.”

  “I’m sorry I caused you such distress during a delightfully peaceful moment in all this hullabaloo.” He offered her the page. “Miss—” He waited.

  Goose bumps erupted as he spoke. “Bettina Gilbert.” Was there a nip in the wind?

  “Miss Gilbert. I feel I owe you some sort of compensation for damaging your art and for the appalling scare.”

  The way he said her name with that hint of pleasure in his tone sent little tingles down her spine. “No, please, this is the way I take notes.” She meant to make quick eye contact, just to be polite, but that one glimpse led to a smile sparkling in his blue eyes. “I–I’m not an artist.” She might not have drowned in the lake, but his eyes drew her like a bottomless well. Dark brown, wavy hair refused to maintain the combed-back style of the day in the humidity.

  “Notes?” Bettina’s admirer brought her attention back to the pad as he thumbed to the pencil drawing of the Grecian columns, domes, and spires on the neoclassical architecture. “That’s about as creatively detailed a note as I’ve ever had the pleasure to view. Wait until you see the art on display at the exposition. I’ve previewed a few in the Manufacturers and Liberal Arts building. Your ‘notes’ could rival many of the exhibits.”

  Coloring, she shook her head. “I appreciate the kind compliment. I’ve developed the ability to sketch in order to log my studies as a botanist.” She shook her head, but a bemused smile touched her lips. “Not an artist.” Holding out her hand, Bettina asked, “May I have my sketch pad back, please?”