“I guess it isn’t so hot,” Penny acknowledged ruefully. “Anyway, why not try it just to keep occupied? It’s deadly sitting here and brooding.”
“All right,” Louise agreed.
The girls removed corks from several bottles and by means of a bent hairpin, removed the papers already inside them. Although they had no light, Penny and Louise scribbled at least a dozen messages. Carefully they recorked every bottle, replacing it in the box.
[“I’m going to put my cameo pin inside this one,” Penny said], unfastening a cherished ornament from her dress. “Someone might see it and open the bottle.”
“We’ll likely hear from it about next Christmas,” her chum responded.
Becoming weary of writing messages, Penny decided to stir up a bit of action. Moving from box to box, she aroused the sleeping birds. Her final act was to jerk the covering from Polly’s cage and playfully pluck the tail feathers of the startled creature.
“Noah! Noah!” the parrot croaked. “Heave out the anchor! Help! Help!”
“Keep it up, Polly,” Penny encouraged, rocking the cage.
The parrot squawked in righteous rage and the other birds chirped excitedly. In the midst of the commotion, a heavy step was heard on deck. Noah, finding the door to the bird room locked, shook it violently.
“Unbolt this door!” he shouted. “Unlock it, I say, or I will break it down!” And he banged with his fists against the flimsy panel.