A CANDLE ON SATURDAYS
Thus it was that after so many tribulations we touched safely at the port in which we should have sought shelter long before. Let no harbinger of ill omen censure us: we do not navigate hearts as we do the other seas of this world. We were happy and began to talk about the future. I promised my wife a settled, comfortable life in the country or just outside the city. We would come here once a year. If we chose the suburbs, it would be far out where no one would come to disturb us. The house, in my opinion, should be neither large nor small but somewhere in between. I planted flowers, chose furniture, a carriage and an oratory. Yes, we had to have a splendid tall oratory of jacaranda with an image of Our Lady of the Conception. I lingered more over this than the other things, partly because we were religious and partly to make up for the cassock that I was going to renounce. But there was also another consideration, which I think was the secret, unconscious desire to ensure divine protection. We would light a candle on Saturdays …