The Small Hours

By RD Francis

Two morally corrupt American males and three females, vacationing in the city of Chartres, France, confess their sins in a “Grand Guignol” overseen by Liutprand, an 8th century Chartres Cathedral monk convicted of heresy for introducing the hourglass to Europe.

Liutprand sees you’re ready to confess. So shall fall the sands of your . . . small hours.

• Language: English
• Publisher: RD Francis
• Release date: Aug 14, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463385234

RD Francis

Schooled as an architectural draftsman and radio broadcaster, and after a detour as a sometimes music journalist, roadie, and rock bassist, a move from behind the microphone to the front of the camera led to the current endeavors of R.D Francis as a screenwriter specializing in sci-fi, horror, and comedy. He now offers his rock journalism and fiction works on Smashwords.

Book preview

Also by R.D Francis

The Devil’s Anatomy

The Ghosts of Jim Morrison,

The Phantom of Detroit,

and the

Fates of Rock ‘n’ Roll

The tales of the wizard behind

the mysterious 1974 album

Phantom’s Divine Comedy: Part 1

The Small Hours

By R.D Francis

Based on the screenplay

The Small Hours

By R.D Francis

Cover Design by R.D Francis

France Paris Cemetery Lachaise image authored by Pixajopari. Free for commercial use. No attribution required. Creative Commons CC0. Courtesy of https://pixabay.com/en/france-paris-cemetery-lachaise-941817/

Cover typefaces Quadrata Preciosa (title) and Oraqle-Script (author name) courtesy of Picfont.com. Free for commercial use. No attribution required.

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialog are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2018 R.D Francis

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share your enjoyment of this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite eBook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work and dedication of this author.

Contents

Chapter 1 — Cathedral

Chapter 2 — Sacred Center

Chapter 3 — Dolmen

Chapter 4 — Quintet of Saints

Chapter 5 — Frozen Music

Chapter 6 — Sandfall

Chapter 7 — 5:28

Chapter 8 — Stoned Immaculate

Chapter 9 — Breaking Water

Chapter 10 — Roses So Sour

Chapter 11 — Dark Eyes

Chapter 12 — Pigalle

About the Author

The Small Hours: 12 Elegies

"This is the dead land

This is the cactus land

Here, the stone images

Are raised, here they receive

The supplication of a dead man’s hand

Under the twinkle of a fading star."

-- T.S Eliot

The Hollow Men, 1925

1—Cathedral

IN the year 750 A.D of the 8th century, morning rises on Gothic architecture’s finest monument, Cathedral of Our Lady Chartres, perched on a hill off the River Eure in Chartres, France. Her twin spires rise as salvation beacons on the horizon of lush countryside farmland.

A horseback phalanx of six infantrymen with shields and spears escort a white steed mounted by a man in his early thirties—Witch Hunter Andre de Lorde.

The phalanx comes to a halt at the rear of the cathedral. The infantrymen dismount. Two stand guard with swords drawn, while two more join shields and overlap their swords to protect Witch Hunter de Lorde. The final two infantrymen approached a weathered door to a subterranean crypt.

Inside, an early-thirties monk, Liutprand, works with a mortar and pestles of crushed powders, and blown glass bulbs. On his table sits a completed, primitive hourglass. Liutprand shocks back as the two infantrymen break down the door. They seize Liutprand. Witch Hunter de Lorde enters under the guard of his two-man phalanstery, while the other two infantrymen, with swords drawn, protect the door.

What is the meaning of this intrusion to my work, says Liutprand.

These are a vile heresy, Liutprand. Witch Hunter de Lorde inspects one of the glass bulbs and smashes it to the floor. How dare you defile the church with your witchery.

Inside the cathedral’s orphanage, a sixty-year-old nun, Modesta, attends to mix of twelve orphaned boys and girls between the ages of 8 to 10 years old. The children scream in shock as two of Witch Hunter de Lorde’s infantrymen break down the door and seize Modesta.

Please, Master de Lorde. Not the children. I beg ye for mercy.

Modesta, you putrid woman. Witch Hunter de Lorde rips away Modesta’s vestments. How dare you defile such innocents. He waves his hand. Take her away, he commands his infantrymen. As two infantrymen drag Modesta from the orphanage, the other two infantrymen round up the crying orphans.

Burn in Hell. One more for the well, chants a gallery of frenzied townspeople inside the Court of the Witchfinder General as Witchfinder General Paul Ratineau oversees the fate of Liutprand and Modesta.

A shout breaks through the gallery chants. They blighted our grains and rout starvation upon us, says a twenty-something shoe-Cobbler.

Witchfinder Ratineau slams his gavel. I will have order in my court. He points the gavel at the Cobbler. Another outburst from the gallery, and they’ll all join the accused. Proceed, Witch Hunter de Lorde.

As you wish, Witchfinder Ratineau. It is proven, continues de Lorde, that Liutprand, once a trusted servant of the church is, in fact, an overseer of a druidical sect. de Lorde picks up an hourglass. Liutprand is a warlock and a practitioner of witchery, with claims that he is able to control time with this device of the devil.

It is not a contrivance of the devil. It’s a scientific instrument discovered on a pilgrimage for man’s betterment, says Liutprand.

Burn the bastard witches, screams a twenty-something Eva Berkson from the gallery.

Kill Satan’s agent, shouts a twenty-something Derek Dundas.

One for the well, yells Derek’s brother, Alexandre from the gallery.

Liutprand poisoned our soils to mire and soured our vineyards, shouts a twenty-something Grocer and his Wife. Throw them both in the well, Witchfinder.

Witchfinder Ratineau strikes his gavel and points to Liutprand. You will not blasphemy this court with your outbursts of heresy. And the gallery, as he waves his gavel at them, is on final notice. The gallery settles down. Liutprand, to embark on a church mission to seek out the devil and conduct apothecary on church grounds is a crime most heinous. Ratineau motions to the court’s infantrymen. This court finds you without virtue and beyond redemption. It hereby condemns you to the depths of the Puits des Saints-Forts. May the Lord have—.

As the two infantrymen drag Liutprand away, he shouts, Ratineau, as you have measured my virtue, so shall I measure the true sinners.

The face of Witchfinder Ratineau morphs into a demonic snakehead. He bellows, Remove that serpent from my sight.

2—Sacred Center

BENJAMIN Muratore, a late-twenties American, meditates in his aisle seat on the upper deck cabin of an Air France A380 Airbus as Games People Play, a 1967 song by Joe South, plays