Once they went to visit the towers of the Church of Our Lady Mary in the late afternoon. The watchman let them in at the little gate at the base of the tower and they climbed up to the room where the day trumpeter was on duty. He was the man that Pan Andrew relieved at night, and he thought it a great honor to have a visit from such a little lady as Elzbietka, and he told her many of the legends which have come down from old days when the church tower was being built.
Joseph picked up his father’s trumpet from the table. “When I first play all the four Heynals you must listen and see if you hear a single note played wrong.”
“I will listen.”
“If I play a wrong note I will give you my cap. If I play two, then I will give you Wolf.” He smiled then, as a boyish thought came to him. “If I ever play the Heynal through to the end, without stopping at the broken note, then you may run to Jan Kanty and tell him to summon the watch, for then something will have happened to me.”
“How do you mean?” She was as ever serious, though he was smiling.
“You know the story of this hymn, the Heynal?”
“Yes,” she answered.
“How, when the Tartars burned the city, the trumpeter stayed on duty and played the hours as he had sworn?”
“Yes. . . . A brave story.”