First Chapter In Book
Chapter 1- "The Horseshoe"- I found a horseshoe the other day. Didn't think much about it. Just slipped it in my pocket. Going down to the river's edge was a daily ritual with me. I'd fish, of course, but that was inconsequential to my real reason for going there. I'm sure my tracks helped to form the wellworn paths that follow the eastern bank, but the day I found the horseshoe I was off the beaten path. Over the years I approached the various holding pools at the same places each time I entered the water. It was just lately that I began concentrating on entrances to the river that were not frequented by many other fishermen. This was the reason I stumbled onto the horseshoe. The horseshoe sure had some age on it. Just how many springs' trillium had been sharing this location with the iron shoe would be anybody's guess. How many generations of red-wing blackbirds sat in alders over its hiding place, buzzing at each other and the surrounding locale? Maybe a hundred or a hundred and fifty. One thing was for sure—the shoe was well-used, being almost wafer-thin. One old nail was still stuck in a hole alongside one edge. Possibly the rain and high water of years past had washed the metal shoe up out of the earth. Maybe I was the first one to see it in over a hundred years. When I arrived back home that morning, I put the horseshoe on the front floor of the car thinking perhaps I'd clean it up a bit and nail it over the barn doorway. That was a week ago. It still remains on the car floor. Early spring on the river is generally bleak and cold. The trees haven't really thrust forth their new buds. The usual late-year inhabitants, other than humans, have not yet shown themselves. The fish—what there are of them—don't bite well either. A few salmon are taken in the opening weeks of April, but not the way they used to be. But there is a certain enjoyment there, knowing that within just a matter of weeks the scenery would change completely. Then the minks would be slinking along the water's edge, in and out of crevices in the rocks and tree roots. They'd slide into the water and before you could count to ten, they'd emerge thirty feet down the shore amongst the roots and rocks again. The minks are fishers and hunters too, like the rest of the animals that live around there. The blue heron will be on the scene in a week or two. He'll be stark still when you see him—if you see him. To many eyes, he blends in with the fallen trees and stumps. He mostly makes two motions: one when he strikes downward with lightning speed for a fish, and another when he is disturbed and flies around the next bend to take up another position in shallow water to resume his fishing. As I dreamed about the alterations in river habitat that will soon be here, my trance was broken by a voice that startled me back to reality." Alex, it's time to eat", my mother yelled from downstairs. I collected my thoughts and lifted the cat off my lap, patting it a couple of times on the head. Then I went downstairs to the kitchen where the usual Thursday night beans and hot dogs were waiting to be heaped onto my plate. The hot dogs with spicy hot mustard tasted good. The beans I could have done without, except for the fact that they would give me some visceral entertainment later on in the evening. Mom, Dad and I ate half our supper in silence. Then Dad broke the quiet. "Did you catch any fish today, Alex?""Nope", I answered. "I don't think they stocked the river yet. Not much going on up there. Hardly any fishermen.""Did you learn anything new in school today?" my mother quizzed. Anything that might be interesting to your father and me?""Nothing I can think of," I replied. "Last week I found an old horseshoe by the Honey Hole. I may give it a washing and then maybe hang it in the barn over the front door.""Maybe it will bring us some good luck", Dad suggested. "Maybe bring us some money to help buy some food. That would be a blessing. When you get the horseshoe cleaned up, I'd like to see it.'"Tomorrow morning I'm going to change the oil in the car",I said, changing the subject. A week from today I'll be able to drive at night"."Yes", Mom replied. "It'll be your seventeenth birthday. Anything special you'd like to do?""No", I answered with resignation. "I'll probably just go up to the river and do some fishing." We finished supper and I went up to my room to study for a math exam that was coming up in a few days. It was still light out at six thirty, and I saw Bess through my west window. God, how my heart yearned for Bess. She hardly knew I existed. If I could get up enough nerve, I'd ask her to go with me to the junior prom. Yeah, if I could get up enough nerve. But I knew I wouldn't. What would a fancy New York girl like Bess want with a country bumpkin like me? I finished studying about isosceles triangles and went to bed. The next morning I rose about six o'clock, took the trash out to be burned, and then started up my car. I'd saved up from six weeks allowance to buy the five quarts of oil that were badly needed in my '54 Ford. Made a mess of my hands and face doing it, but the job was accomplished by seven-thirty, and I went back into the house to clean up for school. I brought the horseshoe in with me and lay it on the dresser. Gee, I thought, if only that shoe would really bring us some good luck. While walking to school that morning, I ran into old Henry, a longtime friend of my family. Henry must have been close to seventy years old when I first knew him as a child. Now he was running close to eighty-five or so. Henry always had a good word for me, and usually he threw in a little philosophical advice to add to his pleasantries. Today was no different. "How ya doin' Henry?" I yelled across the road at the old timer. "Can't say I'm doin' bad; can't say I'm doin' good", Henry barked back at me. "How's yer mom and dad?""Oh, they're okay, I guess. Dad hasn't been called back to work yet, and Mom is having a little trouble with her heart. The doctor says it's worry, but we all know it's a lack of money.""That's too bad," Henry remarked downheartedly. "Seems like luck oughta run yer way one of these days. Been catchin' any fish down at the river?""No", I dejectedly answered. "The water's too high right now. I did find an old horseshoe though. Going to clean it up and hang it over the barn door.""Make sure you nail it with the two ends up," Henry advised. "That way you'll have some good luck for a long time to come. Hang it the other way and the luck will run out of the shoe.""Thanks a lot, Henry", I gratefully acknowledged. "I appreciate your advice."Think nothin' of it," Henry replied modestly. "Take care of yerself, boy." I headed for school and just made the eight o'clock bell. At lunch time, I saw Bess again and wished deep down inside I could find enough courage to talk to her. We passed each other in the hall, and she gave me just the hint of a smile. I knew then that I was head over heels in love with her. Now if I could just get my timing right, I'd be brave enough to ask her to the dance. School was out at three o'clock and I walked home talking to myself. I was rehearsing what I'd say to Bess. At first something would sound right, and then when I repeated it to myself, it would sound stupid. This play-acting occupied my mind the whole mile to my house. When I arrived I'd come to no satisfactory greeting to help me break the ice with Bess. I changed into my grubby clothes, neatly folding one of my two sets of school clothes and packing it away in the dresser. Then my eyes fell on the horseshoe. Maybe I'll wash it now, I said to myself. Then I thought about it for a while and figured if it wasn't clean from being rained on for a hundred years or so from all the rain over those years, it never would be. I took it downstairs and went into the barn. With four thin gauge nails, I tacked the shoe over the doorway to the barn. On the inside, not outdoors. If I was ever going to have good luck, I wanted it each time I left home. If it worked, I'd find another one and put it on the outside, so some luck would return to me whenever I came home. The horseshoe looked nice where it hung with the two curved ends pointing down. I'm sure, I thought, that was the way Henry instructed me to hang it. I went back into the house where Mom was putting together a meal of fried potatoes and pig's liver. I wondered out loud if we would ever be able to eat steak again. "Not until your father gets back on the job", Mom said, with tears in her eyes. "And maybe not even then. We've got a lot of bills piled up around here, and even his job won't help with all of those.""I know, Mom, I know", I whispered as I put my arm around her. "Maybe something good will happen to us before long. I'm going fishing for an hour or so. I'll be back for supper.""Okay, hope you catch something", she said as she wiped the tears from her cheeks. When I arrived at the river's edge in my old Ford, I felt like this was not the right place to be at this time. Intuition seemed to be begging me not to fish. But I pressed on. I took my rod, reel and boots out of the trunk and prepared myself for whatever the river had to offer. I stepped into the water at the place where I'd found the horseshoe, started falsecasting, and immediately got caught up in a tree branch. It took ten minutes to climb the tree and rescue my fly. It was the only Grey Ghost I had. Other fishermen would have snapped their line and left the fly where it was, but I didn't have an assortment of flies the way some fishermen did. After coming back to the head of the pool known as the Honey Hole, I decided to be brave and wade out a little deeper in the fast-moving current. This was something my father had instructed me never to do. "It's not worth it"! he would always say. And, as usual, Dad was right. The gravel bottom started eroding away under my feet as I stood there. All of a sudden I lost my balance and was up to my neck in cold water. Still hanging onto my rod, I was swept downstream. I went under twice and came up each time coughing water. Just as I was being taken under for the third time, a log that juts out from the tail of the pool caught me in its grasp. I coughed and coughed. With my feet now more firmly planted on large rocks, I pulled myself to shore. I was breathing like I'd just run a mile. Needless to say, I was completely exhausted. Phin Billy, an old friend of mine, found me and helped me to my car. "You better get home and get out of those clothes", he warned. "Could catch pneumonia after an accident like that." I couldn't even answer Phin. Somehow I had the strength to control the car the three miles back to the house. After I'd changed my clothes, Dad came into the room and sat down beside me. "You could have drowned down there, you know. Didn't wade out too deep in the current, did you?""Yeah, I guess I did, but I never will again. I learned my lesson". "You know that horseshoe you brought home yesterday?" Dad asked. "You hung it up the wrong way. You should have hung it with the ends pointing up."So there it was. I'd misunderstood Henry's instructions. That had to be the reason I'd fallen in. Dad said I'd better go downstairs and put the shoe in its proper position. I was only too happy to oblige him. The next day was Saturday. Since the prom was only a week away, my thoughts were on Bess. I'd have to make my move soon if I was to do anything at all. Old Henry stopped by around nine o'clock that morning to see how Mom was making out with her heart ailment. When I walked through the kitchen where Henry, Mom and Dad were talking, Henry grabbed my arm. "You know they raised the dam this morning, Alex. Word is that the trout are hittin' like wildfire. Better go down there and catch yer limit"."Thanks, Henry", I replied. "I think I'll do just that". It was Henry to the rescue again, but this time I heard him right. Now maybe I could put some fish on the table tonight. My boots were still soaked on the inside, but that didn't dampen my enthusiasm any. I hightailed it right down to the river. When I arrived at the river's edge, who were there but Phin Billy and Bess. Bess was standing on shore watching Phin cast for trout. He caught a couple ten-inchers while I was putting my rod together and tying on a fly. Here was the love of my life with one of my best friends. I was sure now that she would go to the prom with Phin. That was probably why he asked her down to the river in the first place. Dejected, I stepped into the river with my waterlogged boots and started casting behind Phin. He had the best position to cover the pool, but I could throw my line closer to the bank on the other side. Phin brought another small trout to net. I was feeling about the size of that fish—small! On my next cast, I had a bump. I couldn't be sure it was a fish. Could have been a stick or a rock. But with great determination, I threw my fly again to the same spot and started stripping in line. There was a bump, then another bump, and finally the water exploded with a fish on the end of my line. I knew right away that it was something big. It broke the water three times, the last two coming a foot out of the river. "Get him, Alex!" Bess yelled from the shore. "Oh, please catch him!" Phin stepped out of the water in a gentleman's gesture to let me fight the fish using the whole pool. Finally, I slid my net under the salmon and proudly walked to shore. Bess came up to me and gave me a kiss...right on the mouth! "You sure deserved that fish, Alex." Phin laughed. "After what happened yesterday, you really deserved that fish." It was a twenty-four-inch landlocked salmon. A beautiful thing to behold. Bess stood by my side while I measured it. Then I hit it on the head with a rock. "We're eating this tonight", I exclaimed. "There'll be a good supper on the table tonight. By the way, Bess, would you like to go to the prom with me?""Oh, yes", she said emphatically. "I certainly would!" Phin, Bess and I drove back to the house in separate cars. Phin had to ride by himself. Bess went with me. I was kind of sorry for Phin that he'd lost out on Bess, but I was elated to have her there beside me for the three-mile trip back to the house. When we arrived there, Mom and Dad could see that a commotion was under way. They came outside and gasped at the sight of my salmon."You did good, son", Dad said. "That sure is a pretty fish!""Yes, it is a nice fish, Alex", Mom added. "We'd like to tell you something. Your father has just been given a job painting houses over in Boastown. Two dollars more an hour than he was getting before he was laid off". "It looks like we'll be doing okay for a while around here, son", Dad boasted. "Alex, why don't you show Bess and Phin what's hanging over the inside of the barn door?" Bess, Phin and I left Mom and Dad looking at the salmon and went into the barn. "There's a horseshoe I found down by the Honey Hole last week", I said matter-of-factly. "I think it's just starting to work.""It sure is", Bess and Phin said simultaneously. With that, Phin shook my hand, and Bess put her arms around me and gave me a long kiss. The leaves should be sprouting on the trees around here before long. The animal life should be more abundant in a week or so also. From time to time I'll go to the river and think about how my life has changed for the better. I'm just beginning to understand what this time of year is all about.

The Second Chapter
The second chapter is about the Walton family who move from the stressful life of New York City and settle into a simpler way of living in Belchertown, New Hampshire. It is there that the two Walton girls, Bess and Abigail, become involved with the lead character, Alex Samuels.