In The Beginning by Gail Daley (top 100 books of all time checklist .TXT) 📕

of it, the rose cuttings had been a part of the shipment Giselle brought in with Michaels fruit and nut tree seedlings. Like the trees, they had taken root in St. Antoni well and were now a famous landmark in the city states.

The raised dais near the kitchen doors was waiting for the Hotel orchestra (a string band accompanied by a piano, but Georges insisted on calling it the orchestra since he had persuaded two flute players to move from Port Breakwater). Buffet tables were set up along the other wall and the polished wooden floor shone like glass.

"They look beautiful, don't they," Giselle said to Margo, looking fondly at her three granddaughters.

"Si, Senora," Margo agreed, but her gaze lingered the longest on Iris. Tonight, the girl was an ice princess in pale blue silk, her hair piled high on her queenly head, the color of her gown making her green eyes even more striking.

Bethany, as the bride, was naturally wearing her wedding dress. The dress was of the style popular when the Portal was first discovered, off the shoulder and cut low across the breast, with a huge skirt made of yards and yards of tulle and lace. The buttery white color made the perfect foil for Bethany's bright hair and creamy complexion. Giselle blinked away tears.

Her gaze was caught and held by her youngest granddaughter who was spinning around in the middle of the floor in exuberant good spirits. Jeanne looked beautiful tonight, she thought. Her dress was a turquoise blue with wide skirts that clung lovingly to Jeanne's tall, lush body. It brought out golden highlights in her honey colored hair, the vivid blue of her eyes and natural red of her lips. Despite her high spirits, something was bothering Jeanne; Giselle could see it in her eyes when the girl thought no one was looking. She made a mental note to coax the problem out later. Tonight, was for Bethany to celebrate her wedding and Iris her engagement.

Georges came back to inform Giselle that the guests were arriving.

"Where is your husband?" Giselle asked Bethany.

"In the saloon with Papa and Carlos, where else?"

Giselle made a face, directed Georges to fetch their absent menfolk and gathered the women for the reception line. There had been trouble with Margo when she had discovered Bethany expected her to stand with the family. To her protests that the elite of River Crossing would be offended by her presence, Bethany had retorted this was her reception and she would be offended by Margo's absence. The town, Bethany stated with some of Giselle's regal arrogance, could like it or lump it

"You are my foster mother," Bethany had concluded. "After Mama died, it was you who came and held me when I had nightmares and dried my tears and washed my face. I don't give a—a damn what the rest of the town thinks! I want you there."

Unable to protest in the face of this insistence, Margo now stood next to Giselle in one of Giselle's gowns.

To prevent gatecrashers, Bethany's announcement of the reception had invited all the respectable inhabitants of the Crossing and surrounding area, including the Johnsons. She hoped they wouldn't show up, but she hadn't figured on Ira Johnson's ambition.

"I know you won't mind, Mrs. St. Vyr, but I brought a gate crasher to the party. You remember Jake Lancer, our Rep on the Mining Council, don't you?" Johnson said, as he and his sons entered with a grey bearded older man.

"Indeed, I do," Giselle said smiling. "Jake and I are old friends. If I had known you were in town, Jake, I would have asked you myself."

Johnson frowned, but quickly recovered. "Why you sly dog, Lancer. Why are you keeping such a pretty flirt in the shadows?"

Lancer chuckled. "And give you a chance with her? I'm not so foolish."

"There seems to be a lot of things, I don't know," Johnson agreed. "It sure was a surprise when the prettiest girl in the district marries a stranger a week after she meets him. I guess with your daddy not able to lead his men, he decided he needed a fighter to run his ranch. I'm sorry my boy didn't win your heart, Miss Bethany, and I know he is too."

Giselle intervened hastily when she saw Alec stiffen and Henry Miller move to the side for a better position when the fight started. Long experience with masculine responses to provocation of this kind told her that a best, a SCENE was about to occur; at worst a brawl would break out. She wanted neither one to happen.

"Oh, but last week was not the first time Bethany and Alec have met!" she exclaimed. "Alec’s family is from Copper City where I used to live you know. His mother and I knew each other. She bought several necklaces from me." Giselle told that whopping lie without a blink.

"Surely," Bethany seconded her grandmother, opening her eyes very wide, "Mr. Lancer, you don't think I would marry a man I had never met!" She brought the pointed heel of her dancing shoe down hard on McCaffey's toe to prevent him denying the claim. A spasm of pain crossed his face.

"I can assure you Bethany and I were well acquainted before our marriage," McCaffey's voice was pleasant, and although he was speaking to Lancer, the warning was plainly meant for Johnson, "and I can and will deal with any insinuations that imply otherwise."

Lancer was too canny a politician to be caught in the crossfire he could plainly see building. He ignored most of the preceding conversation and blandly requested Giselle's hand for the first dance.

Giselle, who could tell from the expression on Emory Johnson's face he was about to make further inflammatory remarks, gladly assented and stage-managed a retreat from the looming social disaster. She would not have a scene here.

"I will be delighted, Jake. Bethany, you and Alec must begin. If you will go to the center of the floor, Carlos will direct the musicians to