"The town would never agree to that," said her father, not seeing where he was being led.
"Don't you think the town's people would if you gave them the sixpences all for themselves?"
Her father pushed back his chair in great astonishment and looked at Prissy.
"Little girl," he said very gravely, "who has been putting all this into your head? Has anybody told you to come to me about this?"
Prissy shook her head quickly, then she looked down as if embarrassed.
"Well, what is it? Go on!" said her father, but the words were more softly spoken than you would think only to see them printed.
"Nobody told me about anything—I just thought about it all myself, father," she answered, taking courage from a certain look in Mr. Smith's eyes; "once I heard you say that the money was what the town's-people cared about. And—and—well, I knew that Jane Housemaid wanted to get married to Tom Cannon, and you see they can't, because Tom has not enough wages to take a house."
Prissy was speaking very fast now, rattling out the words so as to be finished before her father could interpose with any grown-up questions or objections.
"And you know I remembered last night when I was lying awake that Catherine would have done this——"