That was what he said to his friends when they met next night all ready for the proposed raid on the Deacon's cherries. There were not a few blank faces in the little crowd when he told his story.
"He might have heard us if he was there when we were talking," said Ned, beating a lively tattoo on the bottom of his basket. "I don't say he did, but he might."
"Oh, pshaw!" exclaimed Con O'Brien. "The Deacon's deaf a little, and I don't believe he could hear what we were a-saying. Why didn't you go round, me boy, to the straw hape, and see if you could hear yourself into the bar-rn?"
A shout went up at that, which, to be sure, was exactly what Con wanted, since there is nothing better than a jolly-sounding laugh to put a boy on good terms with himself and everybody else.
"It's all right," said he. "Come on, now, and don't you be afraid o' nothin'."
Not a boy among them was afraid; but a good many of them couldn't keep their hearts from fluttering in a very queer way when they came, with their baskets and bags, to the gap in Deacon Gammon's orchard wall. The orchard was near the house, and the cherry-trees were scattered about among the apple-trees in a hap-hazard fashion. The house looked dark and still.
"It's just as I told you," whispered Con O'Brien, triumphantly. "The Deacon and his wife have gone to prayer-mating, and the coast is clear. 'Rah for we! Look at 'em, me boys!"
They did more than look at the great, delicious, clustering cherries, hanging from boughs which bent low down with their weight. They pulled them by handfuls, and bags and baskets were rapidly filled.
"But there don't look to be any less 'n there was when we begun," said Con, with a merry chuckle. "Now, boys, isn't this a big help to the old gintleman? He'd niver get away with 'em alone, sure."
There was no sound except the voices of the frogs in the marsh under the hill while the work went briskly on. It was when the boys were nearly ready to leave that they heard a voice in the direction of the Deacon's domicile: