There were others in the Grass River settlement who would have envied the mythical Prince Quippi also. For even at six years of age Leigh had the same quality that marked her uncle. People must love her if they cared for her at all; and they couldn't help caring for her. She fitted into the life of the prairie, too, as naturally as Thaine Aydelot did, who was born to it. The baby gold was soon lost from her hair for the brown-gold like the shimmering sunlight on the brown prairie. The baby blue eyes deepened to the deep violet-blue of overhead skies in June. The pretty pink and white complexion, however, did not grow brown under the kisses of the prairie winds. The delicate china-doll tinting went with other baby features, but, save for the few little brown freckles in midsummer, Leigh Shirley kept year after year the clear complexion with the peach blossom pink on her cheeks that only rarely the young girls of the dry western plains possessed in those days of shadeless homes. Thaine Aydelot looked like a gypsy beside her, he was so brown, and his big dark eyes and heavy mane of dark hair, and ruddy cheeks made the contrast striking. From the first day of their meeting, the children were playmates and companions as often as opportunity offered. They sat together in the Grass River Sabbath School; they exchanged days on days of visits, and the first sorrow of their hitherto unclouded lives came when they found that Leigh was too far away to attend the week-day school. Settlers were filling up the valley rapidly, but they all wanted ranches, and ranches do not make close neighbors. Land-lust sometimes overshadows the divine rights of children. And the lower part of the settlement was not yet equal to the support of a school of its own. The two families still kept the custom of spending their Sabbaths together. And one Sabbath Thaine showed Leigh the books and slate and sponge and pencils he was to take to school the next week. Leigh, who had been pleased with all of them, turned to her guardian, saying gravely: "Uncle Jim, can I go to school wif Thaine?" "You must meet that question every day now, Jim," Asher said. "Why not answer it and be rid of it?" "How can I answer it?" Jim queried. "Virgie, help us with this educational problem of the State," Asher turned to his wife. "Women are especially resourceful in these things, Jim. I hope Kansas will fully recognize the fact some day." "Who is Kansas?" Virginia asked with a smile. "Oh, all of us men who depend so much on some woman's brain every day of our lives," Jim assured her. "Tell me, what to do for my little girl. Mrs. Bennington and some of the other neighbors say I should send her East for her sake--" "And for both of your sakes, Jim, I say, no," Virginia broke in. "The way must open for all of our children here. It always has for everything else, you know."