"All ready!"
Snap! went something that sounded like a shot (but it wasn't), and then away flew the pretty birds to take the messages home to John and Martha. The shot was only a dry stick that Tom Mason snapped to imitate a gun, as they do at bicycle races, but the effect was quite startling and made the girls jump.
"It won't take long for them to get home!" said Bert, watching the birds fly away.
"They'll get lost!" cried Freddie.
"No, they won't. They know which way we came," Nan explained.
"But they was shut up in the basket," argued Freddie.
"Yet they could see," Nan told him.
"Can pigeons see when they're asleep?" inquired the little fellow.
"Maybe," Nan answered.
"Then I'd like to have pigeon eyes," he finished, thinking to himself how fine it would be to see everything going on around and be fast asleep too.