Dr. Paulson looked at Mr. Granger with a condescension that was impossible to miss. “In a few years, no one is going to winnow wheat anymore. Every community will wait with joyful anticipation for the threshing teams to come to town. You’ll pay for the privilege of being the first in line to have your wheat processed. But it takes a man of vision to be the first. We’ll find our man. Follow me, Adam. We won’t accomplish anything else here.”
Dr. Paulson had insisted on coming along so he could gather soil samples for his research. Adam wished he had offered to bring the soil back to the university and had made the trip without the professor.
“It was good to see you again,” Adam said by way of amends. “Please send my regards to Mrs. Granger.”
Mr. Granger spared him a pitying look. “Be careful, Adam. A man’s known by the company he keeps.”
But Adam wanted to be known for being innovative and intelligent. He had felt that the good ideas of the classrooms needed to come out to the farmers, and he wanted to be their ambassador. If he could convince the farmers to give his machine a chance, he could bring prosperity to Oak Springs while making the payments that would keep his dream alive.
And if he could find Bella Eden, then his joy would be complete.
three
You might think about bringing your students.” Ben Eden stole a piece of bacon off her plate. “It could be quite the spectacle.”
Bella looked up from her sewing to watch her father eat half her breakfast. Just as well. She liked to get some handiwork done in the mornings before school and before her wrist started aching. The last thing she needed was greasy fingers to spot the bodice of the gown she was reworking. She picked up her spoon, her thimble clinking against the handle, and took a bite of cinnamon-dusted oatmeal.
“Do you think it’d be worthwhile?” she mumbled. “The juggler was amusing, but he didn’t help the students with their exams.”
“I’ll tell you one thing. If your students let their education turn them into a dunce like that professor, we might as well close the doors of the school right now. It takes a lot of study to figure out how to be as disagreeable as that man.” Her father wore his dark hair longer than most men, but it was his glory, as untamed as a horse’s mane.
“Maybe it’ll spark some imagination,” Bella said. “It’s good for the kids to see the latest technology.” Taking the thread between her teeth, she bit off the excess, wrapped it carefully around the spool for future use, then folded the dress and dropped it in her basket. “Time to go. That bell’s not going to ring itself.”
Her hand lingered atop her basket. All day she’d be thinking of the new cut that she was trying to emulate from Harper’s Bazar. By the time she returned from school and helped her pa with chores, there wouldn’t be enough light to continue. But the town needed a teacher, and ever since she’d fallen from that tree, she hadn’t been able to do as fine a stitch as before. After a bit, her wrist started to hurt, and that was that.
Bella picked up her lunch pail. Teaching hadn’t been her plan. She’d always been an eager learner but had never thought of herself as studious, mostly because of her poor performance under duress. Sitting in class, she soaked up the lessons that old Miss Hoyt had taught them, but when she looked down at the blank lines of the examination booklet, every fact simply vanished. She could no more produce the right information than she could create lace out of corn husks.
That was why she’d told the school board no when they asked if she’d be willing to replace the retiring teacher. But even after her wrist had healed, she found that the future she’d planned was unlikely. She might as well help the community, if that was what they needed. And as it turned out, teaching wasn’t the same as testing. In fact, her struggles gave her patience with her less confident students, something that parents were generous to acknowledge.
Bella patted their bird dog as she walked out the door, leaving it propped open so her mother could catch the morning breezes as she put away the breakfast dishes. Her spirits were lifted by the thick golden sea that rippled around her. Harvest time. The early summer had been gentle. No droughts, no pestilence, no storms, no fires. With their typical pessimism, the local farmers refused to celebrate a good crop yet, but beneath their grumbling, one could hear the careful hope that this year would make up for several lean seasons. She hoped so. It would be good to see her students well-fed and unconcerned through the winter.
Something up ahead caught her attention. Was that the machine her father had spoken of? It had to be. Bigger than the saw at the mill and twice as ungainly, it blocked the road next to the oak tree. As she approached, the sun reflected off the machine’s metal sides and warmed her face. The shape reminded her of a dragon. A dragon in armor. How fantastic would it be if it breathed fire while it worked? She put up a hand to shade her eyes, but even with that help she couldn’t see anyone around. Surely the owner hadn’t abandoned it.
Then, from beneath the dark canopy of the oak, she heard a man’s voice projecting like he was doing oratory.
“This tree is remarkable, I’ll grant you that, but there are hundreds of similar oaks in this part of the country. I’m afraid your admiration
