Cuthbert took it from her, but the penny was an old one, and the date was difficult to see. The snow began to fall upon them in heavy flakes. Cuthbert took out his handkerchief and polished the coin. And then an odd thing happened, for suddenly, as he polished, the stream and the hazel copse seemed to fade away; and it was another girl—a grown-up girl—who had just given him the penny.
"A penny for your thoughts," she said, and Cuthbert knew that she wasn't speaking to him, but to somebody else; and the thoughts that came into his head weren't his own, but a grown-up man's. He knew that they were somebody else's thoughts, because he was thinking his own thoughts too; and the other person's thoughts were of two kinds—the weak thoughts that he decided to tell the girl, and the strong thoughts that went into the penny.
The thoughts that he told the girl were that, when he got to South America, he was going to spend his spare time studying the birds there. He was going to write a book about them, and perhaps, when he had written his book, he would get a job looking after a museum. But his strong thoughts, that he didn't tell her, were "I love you and want to marry you; but I mustn't tell you that, because I'm only a carpenter, and you're a lady, and ever so far above me."
"What's the matter?" said Doris.
Cuthbert gave her the penny.
"It's a queer sort of penny," he said. "Catch hold of it."
Doris took it.
"I don't see anything queer in it," she said. So Cuthbert polished it once more. This time he polished it harder, so that when he gave it to Doris again it was quite warm from the polishing; and Doris seemed to be standing in a strange sort of room, full of old-fashioned furniture and heavy ornaments. The same girl said, "A penny for your thoughts," and the same thoughts came to her as had come to Cuthbert. The day drew in. It was almost dark now, and the snow was glistening on their shoulders.
"I know what's happened," she said. "His real thoughts were so strong that they all went into the penny."
Cuthbert nodded.