The other bells

The catholic church at the top of the village has four bells but they cannot be rung like our English bells. Change ringing is not possible as the bells are fixed and are electrically operated with hammers to ring the hours and quarters and the Angelus twice a day. One of the bells does not ring true so the bells sound odd and quite distinctive. The also repeat the hour strike at two minutes past which is a very useful French system on their tower clocks. If you miss counting the first hour strike, you can pay attention to the second, especially useful if you are working in the fields. It was my turn to take the service this morning. We rang our own bells but there were only five of us. However, Mrs TT felt strong enough to attend church and she joined us for the final ring so we rang six. I was due to play tennis in the afternoon but my partner had to cancel due to a domestic crisis. Then my exchange language student cancelled our online French/English conversation as he had been asked to join a family meal. That meant a quiet day so I settled down to my book and the rugby.