“He’d be the fool if he did that.”
He certainly didn’t strike her as such. Not in terms of intelligence, anyway. But what did she really know about him? He shared tidbits here and there, spoke of his brother and his parents, but never of his work. Never of the Revolution. Never of anything that determined why he’d decided to come here.
“Do you think . . . ?” Afraid even to put words to the nebulous fear that had been plaguing her, she had to start over. “Do Daddy and the admiral really trust him? Or is it, perhaps, that Daddy’s trying to keep an eye on him for Blinker?”
Mama’s brush paused mid-stroke. “Why would you ask such a thing?”
“Because . . .” Because her father had slung an arm around her shoulders last Sunday after the gentlemen had left and said how glad he was that she wasn’t quite so eager to leave them as Ivy. Maybe it was just Daddy teasing her. Or maybe it was a warning not to give her affection—or her trust—to the Russian too quickly.
A lesson she’d learned the hard way four years ago. Sunday night she’d gone up to her room and dug out the letter her old friend Johanna had posted to her as her family left England. Don’t take it personally, it had said at the end.
She wouldn’t even have considered it, if not for those words. Then she couldn’t help but do so. Couldn’t help but remember anew that, all that time, her supposed friend had been someone other than who Lily had thought. She’d knowingly used her. Deceived her.
Not a mistake Lily cared to repeat—especially with a man who intrigued her in a way simple friends had never done.
Mama patted her hand and then motioned toward the path they’d followed into the park. “There’s Jamie. I suppose that means we ought to pack up, if I mean to make my aid meeting on time. Are you certain you don’t want to join me today?”
Her eyes darted to the path where Eaton’s grandson was strolling, ready to help them carry their supplies home again, then back to her mother. “I promised Daddy I’d have lunch with him.”
Mama’s smile was warm. Indulgent. Unsuspecting. “That sounds far lovelier for you. And while your father has certainly not told me of any suspicions he has of Mr. Marin, if they exist, I’ll say quite readily that I like him. And not just because he saw my point with the propaganda poster either.” She paused. Grinned. “At least, not entirely.”
Chuckling, Lily stood, hands moving toward the easel and their art supplies. Doing by rote the familiar while the forbidden danced on her tongue. She didn’t want to ask the question that had settled there, ready to spring. But she had to. “Do you ever regret not helping Daddy when he asked? With the propaganda?”
Mama’s hands didn’t pause, just gathered her brushes. “I do not. Perhaps my stance is unpopular in our crowd, but . . . art is a powerful thing. It can inspire us, move us, create feeling in us. I cannot justify its use in deception.”
Lily unclipped her paper. “But what if it could help end the war?”
“Even so. One must always ask if the ends justify the means. After working all these years in the hospital, you’ve seen firsthand the damage wrought by mustard gas. I’m sure the inventor of that was told that he could help end the war faster. Do you think that makes it right for him to have done so?”
Lily tossed her pencil case into the basket with Mama’s paints and brushes, knowing her frustrations were mirroring her mother’s growing agitation. “You cannot possibly be likening propaganda to poison gas!”
“No.” A ghost of a smile settled on Mama’s lips. “It’s worse, I think. Poison gas destroys only a man’s body. But propaganda, Lily . . . it tells them a story, invites them to believe in something it cannot back up. It lures our men into supposedly glorious battle and then crushes their spirits—their very faith in God and country—when it instead delivers an inglorious hell on earth.”
Lily wanted to deny it. Wanted to provide the arguments Daddy always did—that men had always told of the glories of battle to inspire one another to take it up. That they’d always found one cause to champion and another to put down to rouse the hearts of their neighbors toward action. The ideas were nothing new. Just the methods.
But at the same time, like her mother pointed out, Lily had seen those men in hospital. The ones scarred not by gas on the outside but by horror on the inside. This war, she’d heard her father and his friends say quietly behind closed doors, was not like any that came before. The weapons were so much more deadly. The offensives so long and pointless. The death tolls so high. The boys who signed up with glee, determined to do their bit for king and country, came home broken, disillusioned, and . . . empty. Unable to believe any longer in patriotism.
Unable, all too often, to even believe in God.
Mama may have a point when it came to propaganda that made promises so blatantly false. But that wasn’t what Lily’s work was used for. Would her mother see the difference? “But what if . . . what if you could do something that would help the men in the field?”
Leaning over to pour out her rinse water, Mama shook her head. “I’ve tried to think of a way to do that, my love. To help them see God still at work in the trenches.” She straightened, her face lined with failure. “My imagination isn’t so good. I know He is there. But I don’t know how to show Him.”
Lily slid her drawing into her portfolio. “I can imagine a situation where your art could be used to directly help, though. What if Admiral Hall came to you and said he wanted to convince the German High Command that we were trying to achieve a particular aim here at home and needed false propaganda posters to supposedly leak to them? Wouldn’t that be different?”
Her mother looked amused. “Perhaps you ought to try to find a way to show God to the lads in the trenches, Lily. Your imagination is apparently better than mine. I cannot fathom Blinker ever coming to me with such a plan.”
“But if he did?”
Mama laughed, but it wasn’t her usual bright, full-hearted one. Just a dry echo blowing in the wind. “I don’t know. Then I suppose I’d have to wrestle with whether using the gift God has given me in order to lie is excusable if it’s lying to one’s enemies instead of one’s friends. From all I know of my Lord, He does not make such distinctions. And yet . . .” she said, snapping the case of paints closed, “it isn’t a question your father wrestles with at all, and he is a man of solid faith.” She shrugged, not looking exactly happy with the disparity.
Perhaps Lily’s answering sigh gave away more of her own torment than she intended.
Mama reached over to cup her cheek. “I know it bothers you, this disagreement your father and I have over this. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be so vocal about my opinions.”
Lily shook her head. What else could she do? And conjured up a smile. “I think Ivy finds it amusing.”
“You don’t, though. I suppose because you’re an artist too, so the questions hit closer to home.”
Closer than she knew. She looked at the watercolor her mother had created. Two hours of her time, nothing she ever meant to sell, and yet it stole Lily’s breath. The way she used color was simply astounding. Lily herself hadn’t even noticed that tinge of blue in the sidewalk. The hint of yellow in the sky. Not until Mama put it to paper. “I’m not an artist like you.”