All the Parts of the Soul

When I was a boy of twelve, I saw a long-tailed star. It was a hot night, and stagnant air hung heavy over the city under plague curfew. Rue Tabazan was deserted save for the crier who paced slowly ringing the warning bell. In my childish zeal to contribute to civic duty, like my father, I leaned over the window frame watching for curfew-breakers or, most thrilling of all, the terror of the plague-spreaders. Sometimes I would sit for hours, not knowing what I would do if I actually saw one of these servants of the Devil. But that particular night I was distracted from my vigil by a white light in the sky. Far across the lake, it lit up the snowy peaks of the Mont Blanc so that I could discern every ridge and contour, like a secret glimpse of heaven itself. In awe I shook my elder brother awake, and he was unwilling at first but when I finally persuaded him to stagger bleary-eyed to the window, he too widened his eyes in amazement.
‘What is it, Pierre?’ I asked him, unable to tear my eyes away. ‘Is it an angel?’
‘It is a portent of some sort, that’s for certain.’
We watched in silence as the star continued its passage, slow and steady across the sky, with a tail that quivered like white fire. And we prayed for good fortune; for how could anything so beautiful ward ill?