Dr. Carey's face was magnetic in its earnestness, and even in the sorrow of the moment Asher remembered that he had known Virginia all her life and he wondered subconsciously why the two had not fallen in love with each other. And so it was that as the Sunflower Inn had received the first bride and groom to set up the first home in the Grass River Valley, so the first baby born in the valley opened its eyes to the light of day in the same Sunflower Inn. And out of this sod cabin came the first form to its burial. And it was the Sunflower Ranch that gave ground for God's Acre there for all the years that followed. It happened, too, that as Jim Shirley had been the friendly helper at that bridal supper and happy house-warming more than three years ago, so now it was Jim Shirley who in the hour of sorrow was the helper still. * * * * * The winter season passed with the passing of the blizzard. The warm spring air was delicious and all the prairies were presently abloom with a wild luxuriance of flowers. Asher carried Virginia to the sunshine at the west window from which she could see the beautiful outdoor world. "We wouldn't leave here now if we could," she declared as she beheld all the glory of the springtime rolling away before her eyes. "Bank accounts bring comforts, but they do not make all of life nor consecrate death. We have given our first-born back to the prairie. It is sacred soil now," Asher replied. And then they talked of many things, but mostly of Dr. Carey. "I have known him from childhood," Virginia said. "He was my very first sweetheart, as very first sweethearts go. He went into the war when he was young. I didn't know much that happened after that. He was at home, I think, when you were in that hospital where I first saw you, and--oh, yes, Asher, dear, he was at home when your blessed letter came, the one with the old greasy deuce of hearts and the sunflower. It was this same Bo Peep, Carey's boy, who brought it to me up in the glen behind the big house. Horace left Virginia just after that." Virginia closed her eyes and lived in the past again. "I wonder you never cared for Dr. Carey, Virgie. He is a prince among men," Asher said, as he leaned over her chair. "Oh, I might, if my king had not sent me that sunflower just then. It made a new world for me." "But I am only a common farmer, Virgie, just a king of a Kansas claim, just a home-builder on the prairie," Asher insisted. "Asher, if you had your choice this minute of all the things you might be, what would you choose to be?" Virginia asked. "Just a common farmer, just a king of a Kansas claim," Asher replied. Then looking out toward the swell of ground beside the Grass River schoolhouse where the one little mound of green earth marked his first-born's grave, he added, "Just a home-builder on the prairies."