I laughed, and Sybel, like a good former manager, said to Mary, “Merrimount means that except for him, Martin, and Janice, every member of the former New Art movement of any consequence is involved in this opera. It’s the only thing they’ve been able to agree on long enough to bring to the public attention.”

Mary nodded, held her tongue. She knew Sybel didn’t like her, and she knew Sybel didn’t like her because I didn’t like her.

“Admittedly, a captive audience,” Duncan said, “with nothing else to do except hunker down in their homes.”

“True,” I said. “I suppose there is a hint of desperation in it.”

Desperation during those days could not be hidden at the opera. In such close quarters, the truth of our diets would begin to manifest as a sour smell of stale bread and vegetable broth and, oddly enough, doorknobs. Some enterprising individual had discovered that many of the doorknobs in the city had been made from sawdust and ox blood. If heated and distilled, a doorknob could be eaten, given an extremity of hunger.

“Martin and Merri are living on the kindness of friends and neighbors, you know,” Sybel said.

“If he’s painting at all,” Duncan said, “it’s with borrowed canvases and stolen paints. He’ll get the odd job here and there, but work must be scarce.”

“Yes it is, my dear Duncan,” I heard Mary whisper, “but you don’t need to worry.”

He didn’t need to worry because Mary’s parents had conspired to acquire an apartment for her out of the way of both the local Hoegbotton and F&L militias, in an area that had not yet been the target of attacks or skirmishes. Mary, meanwhile, had yet to realize that, having taken Duncan in, she might have more worries than the average person where the gray caps were concerned. (She had less to worry about. Trust me. I protected her well.)

My gaze burned through the darkness that protected Mary.

“What are your plans after the war?” I asked Duncan.

Was that the hint of a smile on my brother’s face?

Mary answered for him, making Sybel sit up and pay attention, as if he had a bet riding on the answer: “The same as now. To continue my studies. To write books, like Duncan’s.”

Well, it was true that she continued her studies during the war. In fact, the war often had no impact on her whatsoever, not emotionally. But she didn’t want to write books like Duncan’s. She wanted to write books like Duncan. That became clear soon enough.

A hush fell over the audience. The lights could not dim, but the curtain could rise. It chose that moment to do so. I could either stare into the now silent darkness or turn toward the stage.