  We describe an explicit statistical model of local hidden variables that
reproduces the predictions of quantum mechanics for the ideal Franson
experiment and sheds light on the physical mechanisms that might be involved in
the actual experiment. The crux of our model is the spontaneous breaking of the
time-translation gauge symmetry by the hidden configurations of the pairs of
photons locked in time and energy involved in the experiment, which acquire a
non-zero geometric phase through certain cyclic transformations.
