St Maurice

We were a raggedly lot outside the cathedral at 2.30 pm;  Tatyana, Olga, Pasha, Arina, Anna shoveling ice cream into her mouth, Babeth with her binoculars.
We found Père David in the cathedral being annoyingly pious.

He led us up the 200 steps and into the bell tower.   He looked at his watch every few seconds while giving the spiel on the 14 bells, the beautiful carpentry that keeps them in place and the stone spire above them.

Then we had to run before 3 struck.  

We emptied out at the base of the spire with a stiff wind blowing from the sea and the town was beautiful beneath us.

Père David explained how the huge brass bells in their ancient oak cradles were controlled by a computer in the sacristy.  He explained that the clock on the spire was regulated by a a satellite and when the clocks go back tomorrow night the clock will right itself. Nico said something about artificial intelligence and faith in god and I stamped on his foot, Babeth talked to her binoculars and the Ukranians asked me for a spontaneous translation which I couldn't provide because David doesn't take to interruptions.
We descended the 200 steps and went into the sacristy where Père David showed us a bone belonging to Saint Maurice, the patron Saint of Mirepoix.   Nico said it was his femur but that would have made him very small.   Père David told us that Maurice was an Egyptian martyr who was killed during some shenanigans in Switzerland.  He took us into St Maurice's alcove off the nave and showed us a painting of St Mo as a blond, blue eyed warrior which he pfffd at and then drew our attention to a Greek-style icon of a black St Mo with an affro.  We all agreed that the black man was our St Mo which made Père David happy.

Père David wanted to flex a bit with his software and programmed the bells to play Ode to Joy.

I lit a candle for all my dead.

We left the cathedral and Père David and Babeth started gossiping along the line of he said, she said, what a bitch ....etc and outside, in the sunlight he became almost like a teenager who just wants to dish the dirt. 

We all went and had a beer at Atmos.