The Council of Geleau (1347), Part 284

 "But why a sitar, for Chrissakes?" moaned Fabien.

"Oh, I dunno," replied St Pascual, jutting his jaw forward and generally looking obstinate and wrong, "it was a musical decision."

"Sitars have been used in every genre of music known to man and they always sound out of place. Hell, they even sound out of place in Indian music. Of all instruments ever invented, the sitar is perhaps unique in always sounding de trop, no matter when and where played."

"Your shoulders do not appear to be the same height," murmured St Pascual darkly, "Like Richard the Third."

Fabien took a sip from his Stella, which is not easily done when suspended from a crane 200 feet above a shark-filled swimming pool. Fortunately, he was not suspended from a crane 200 feet above a shark-filled swimming pool, which perhaps accounts for why he found no particular difficulty in performing the action in question. "My shoulders have been admired by beautiful women across five continents," he protested.

"If the beautiful women were five continents away, no wonder they couldn't see the difference in height."

"You're just jealous."

"And you're Provençal. But I'll be sober in the morning".

"I don't know how you got to be a bloody saint. Most people have to wait until they're dead before they get canonised. What did you do - bribe the Pope?"

"Nah . Tried that. No luck there, the guy's as rich as Croesus, didn't bite. In the end I just found a new church. One that was short of saints. They took me on like a shot, sent me on a course, develop my sainthood skills. Never quite got the hang of miracles, but the rest was easy. It's called the Church of Shetland, by the way."

"So impress me."

"How do you mean?"

"I dunno, you're a saint, do something saintly."

St Pascual raised his eyes to heaven, placed his pint glass carefully on a torn beermat, stood up, produced a bunch of leather thongs attached to a polished wooden handle from his briefcase, and gave himself a perfunctory and distinctly unenthusiastic lash across the left shoulder. He then carefully replaced the thongs in the briefcase, sat down and took another sip.

"Well? Is that it?"

"You said Do Something Saintly. I just did. Self-flagellation is saintly. It says so in all the manuals."

"But aren't you supposed to do it a lot?"

"How much is a lot?"

"I dunno. Aren't you supposed to take your jacket off first, or something?"

"I don't see why."

"But anyone can do that. What about something more difficult?"

"Like what?"

"See that policewoman over there?"

"Sure."

"She has bad breath. Go and ask her to dance. While dancing, make sure that your nose is within ten centimetres of her mouth at all times. Breathe only through your nose."

"Come off it. I'm not that saintly."

"Oh, don't be such a wuss."

"All right. You're on."

And thus it was that a poor stable hand (except after a few pints) from somewhere like Valencia entered the annals of Sainthood, as St Pascual Bailón, the official patron of not only poverty, stables, hands, places like Valencia, annals, sainthood, milk cartons and remanded prisoners, but also of dancing and halitosis.

Meanwhile, somewhere in Catalonia...