This week’s Writers Island prompt, Message In a Bottle, was a good one! I wrote a story last Spring as an entry in a contest that had the same phrase as part of its paragraph prompt. Plus it had a 1000-word-count limit. Writers Island has given me the opportunity to dust off that story and rewrite it for my contribution to this Tuesday’s posting. So, I am able to offer readers another story of “Renewal,” last week’s prompt, as in renewal of a story, while adhering to this week’s theme.

Gramps’ Rescue
By S.M. Toy

“Gramps, what’s the most amazing thing you ever found?”

Shifting Sara’s weight from his right knee to the other, Gramps pulled the ever-present pipe out of his mouth. Scratching his forehead with the same hand’s little finger, he said, “Hard to decide, Princess. I find something amazing every few days.”

She searched his eyes. “But what’s the most amazing thing?”

Turning his head, he looked over her head, out past the verandah railing down towards the beach. “Well, now. The most amazing thing? That would have to be a rum bottle floating in the surf. Found it right down there.” He pointed with his pipe’s stem.

“Aw, Gramps, I meant treasure – real treasure,” she said, rolling her eyes.

He looked at his granddaughter’s face. “Hold on. It wasn’t just any ordinary rum bottle, mind you. A rum bottle that came here all the way from the Caribbean. A bottle… with a message inside.”

Sara’s eyes widened in excitement. This was more like it!

Gramps settled in to telling his story. “Yesiree. I found it right down there, down by the headland.” He pointed again, but this time out beyond the receding foamy water to where a buoy marked the reef. “There was a note inside that bottle, too – a note that read, ‘I am being held captive by pirates. Please Help!’ And it was signed, ‘Princess Wanda.’” He nodded, his jaw jutting out in confirmation of what he had said.

“Really?” Sara gulped, her wondering eyes ablaze.

“Really and truly,” Gramps nodded again, setting his lips in a true straight line. His pipe had gone out so he reached into a breast pocket and pulled out a box of wooden matches. Tamping down what tobacco remained in the pipe’s bowl, he struck the match with a thumbnail and relit the pipe. Placing the stem back in his mouth, he took a few thoughtful puffs, removed the pipe, and said, “I took that note to the police station, the pirate ship was found, and they returned the princess to her family’s castle… in England. Her mother, the Queen, phoned to thank me personally.” He stuck the pipe stem back in his mouth, clamping down on it.

“Wow!” Sara exhaled with astonishment and shivered. “A real queen, pirates, and a princess!”

The screen door squeaked open, Gran’s face appearing in the crack.

“Oh, you drunken fool!” she said. “Don’t be filling the chile’s head with your sea-story nonsense! You was only ever a ferry-boat captain anyways. I don’t know where ya gets all this high-seas business. Now, com’on, the two of ya. Get ready for service. It’s time.” As if on Gran’s cue, a church bell began to ring in the distance.

“But, Gran. We was going to the beach. Gramps promised to take me beachcombing. We might find treasure!” Sara’s face burst into a smile and she turned back to bestow it on her grandfather.

“You’re not going anywheres but church this morning, Chile. And I can tell ya now, and for sure, that the only treasure you two will ever find in that surf is whatever comes out of that old coot’s imagination. Stop lyin’ to her, telling her all them fool stories. Now, Sara, get in here and put on your good shoes. You can’t go to church in them boots. You too, Samuel.” Like a startled turtle, Gran pulled her head back into the house, slamming the door.

Leaning her face into his white beard, Sara said, “Gramps, I’d rather go to the beach.” She stroked the other side of his bristly face with her hand.

“Me too, Princess,” he said around the pipe. Then taking it out of his mouth, he sighed, and added, “But Gran’s my captain now. Captain to both of us. And you know that sailors always have to do whatever the captain tells them. Let’s go.” Sliding her off his knee, he pushed himself up from the rocking chair. He placed a gnarled hand on her blonde head and promised, “Later today. We can have a good look-see down along the shore.”

“Okay, Gramps. But did you keep that note? The one from Princess Wanda?”

“What? Oh, that… No I had to hand it over to the police – as evidence, you know. Now, let’s go. Gran’s already as angry as a late-season Nor’easter.”

That night, when she could hear Gran snoring, and knew the coast was clear, Sara crawled out of bed. This would be her only chance. It was too dark to see anything at all so she fumbled around for the cord and opened the blinds, letting in the silver-light of a half-moon. She’d hidden the note between pages of Treasure Island, Gramps’ favourite book. He’d been reading it to her every night before she went to bed. But not that night. It was Sunday and Gran didn’t allow book reading on Sundays. Sara flipped through the pages and found the note, folding it, making it disappear into her hand. Slipping out of the room, she crept like a mouse past her grandparents’ closed door, down the stairs, and into the kitchen.

The rusty hinge complained when she pulled the cupboard door open. Holding her breath, she paused to listen. Gran was still snoring. Sara exhaled with relief. Reaching inside the cupboard, she groped around until she found what she’d been searching for. She clutched the neck of the bottle and pulled it out, holding it up to the moonlight that shone through the kitchen window. It was half-full of dark liquid. She unscrewed the cap and sniffed.

“Yuck!” The strong alcohol assaulted her young nose. That’s a Gramps’ smell. That, combined with pipe tobacco, was how she always knew if Gramps had been in a room. Sara smiled. She was about to do something that would help them both, in just a few hours. She took the bottle over to the sink, poured out all the rum, then shook the last drops from the lip. Gramps won’t mind. She rinsed the bottle, dried it with a dishtowel, and then replaced the cap.

Sara went to the front door, carefully opened it, and walked out on to the verandah, making sure not to slam the screen door behind her. The outdoor sound of lapping waves along the shore wasn’t loud enough; she could still faintly hear Gran’s snorts and snuffles coming from inside, even after the door was securely closed. Gramps always said, “That woman can make more noise while she’s sleeping than she does when she’s awake, like a full-force gale some nights.” But he never said that within Gran’s hearing. The wind was picking up and was even beginning to drown out Gran. There was enough breeze to speedily twist and turn several decorative windsocks hanging from the rain gutter across the front of the house.

Sara crept down the front stairs, her bare feet chilled by the cold wood. The moon lit up the stone path ahead, allowing her to safely walk alone, but she scurried now out of excitement and fear, wanting to hurry to get the job done before being discovered. She soon arrived at the beach.

Standing at the edge of the water, just out of the waves’ reach, Sara unscrewed the bottle’s cap, but hesitated before placing the note inside. To make sure she hadn’t picked out the wrong piece of paper, she unfolded the scrap and, holding it up in the moon’s light, she read out loud, but mainly from memory, “Help! We is being held captiv by Captin Gran! Please resku us! Sined – First Mate Gramps and Cabin Boy Princess Sara.”

The paper fluttered in the breeze; she clutched it tighter in her hand so it wouldn’t fly away. When the air had calmed again, she folded the note, shoving it down into the bottle, and screwed the cap back on good and tight.

She raised her arm and threw the glass bottle as far as she could into the dark sea. The bottle bobbed where it landed, a few feet from shore. Then, with the very next wave, it disappeared completely.