It made it seem that there was bigger and more tender work for women than preserving inviolate those things women had left.  As she drew near the harbor of New York she was more interested in the United States of America as related to that girl than as associated with her own forefathers who had fought for it long before.

And as it had been for them to fight in the new land, it seemed that it was for her, not merely to cherish the fact of their having fought, not holding that as something apart—­something setting her apart, but to fight herself; not under the old standards because they had been their standards, but under whatsoever standards best served the fight.  It even seemed that the one way to keep alive those things they had left her was to let them shape themselves in whatever form the new spirit—­new demands—­would shape them.

Mrs. Prescott was troubled by her silence.  “Katie dear,” she said, “you come of a long line of fine and virtuous women.  In these days when everything seems attacked—­endangered—­that, at least—­that thing most dear to women—­most indispensable—­must be held inviolate.  And by such as you.  Wherever your ideas may carry you, don’t let that be touched.  Remember that the safety of the world for women goes, if you do.”

It turned Katie to Ann.  Safety she had found.  Then again she looked down at the immigrant girl—­beautiful girl that she was.  And wondered.  And feared.

She turned to Mrs. Prescott with a tear on her eyelashes and a smile a little hard about her lips.  “Would you say that ‘fine and virtuous women’ have succeeded in keeping the world a perfectly safe place for women?”

Mrs. Prescott was repelled, but Katie did not notice.  She was looking with a passionate sternness off at New York.  “Let anything be touched,” she spoke it with deep feeling.  “I say nothing’s too precious to be touched—­if touching it can make things better!”

Mrs. Prescott had gone below.  Katie feared that she had wounded her, and was sorry.  She had not been able to help it.  The face of that immigrant girl was too tragically eager.

They were almost in now, close to Governor’s Island, over which the flag was flying.  It gripped her as it had never done before.

“Boy,” she said to Worth, perched on a coil of rope beside her, “there’s your country.  Country your people came to a long time ago, and fought for, and some of them died for.  And you’ll grow up, Worth, and you’ll fight for it.  Not the way they fought; it won’t need you to fight for it that way; they did that—­and now that’s done.  But there will be lots for you to fight for, too; harder fights to fight, I think, than any they fought.  You’ll fight to make it a better place for men and women and little children to live in.  Not by firing guns at other men, Worth, but by being as wise and kind and as honest and fair as you know how to be.”