Peter and Cole found out about the pen, and then the servants learned of it, and the boys were joked and laughed at unmercifully.
"I believe them boys is distracted," said old Balla, in the kitchen; "settin' a pen in them woods for to ketch hogs,—with the gap open! Think hogs goin' stay in pen with gap open—ef any wuz dyah to went in!"
"Well, you come out and help us hunt for them," said the boys to the old driver.
"Go 'way, boy, I ain' got time foolin' wid you chillern, buildin' pen in swamp. There ain't no hogs in them woods, onless they got in dyah sence las' fall."
"You saw 'em, didn't you, Willy?" declared Frank.
"Yes, I did."
"Go 'way. Don't you know, ef that old sow had been in them woods, the boys would have got her up las' fall—an' ef they hadn't, she'd come up long befo' this?"
"Mister Hall ketch you boys puttin' his hogs up in pen, he'll teck you up," said Lucy Ann, in her usual teasing way.
This was too much for the boys to stand after all they had done. Uncle Balla must be right. They would have to admit it. The hogs must have belonged to some one else. And their mother was in such desperate straits about meat!
Lucy Ann's last shot, about catching Mr. Hall's hogs, took effect; and the boys agreed that they would go out some afternoon and pull the pen down.