“I have in mind a water landscape inspired by Lapwing,” Bridgette said with a smile at Chris. “Here’s how it will work. I’ll start by painting a dragonfly flitting about a lily pad. I will then fill in the objects representing our field names. Four are natural to a seaside scene. Labradors are retrievers of waterfowl. Liverworts are water-loving plants. Lapwings are plovers that live in watery habitats, and limpets are mollusks that must reside in bodies of water to survive.”

“And Lodestar?” Bucky asked.

“The North Star that looks over all,” she said. “I can leave messages to all of you in the form of some feature typical to your symbol without the enemy ever being aware that it is a code mark.”

Victoria spoke up. “In other words, your encryption would be disguised as some part of the artwork.”

Bridgette smiled at her understanding. “That’s right, Liverwort.”

Victoria looked impressed. “Sounds good to me.”

“Or put another way, our symbols would serve as our individual code pads for you to leave messages to us,” Bucky said.

“Right again, Lodestar. If you see a new detail on your star, you’ll know the message came from me and what it means. All we have to do as a group is come up with code markings suitable to your symbols and memorize their significance.”

Bucky said, “It could work since we’ll all be living in the same neighborhood and could make a point of walking by the wall every day. As residents of the area, our interest would be natural.”

“I agree with Lodestar, but haven’t the Nazis already caught on to the French Resistance’s use of graffiti as a propaganda tool and a means to send coded messages?” Brad asked.

“Good point, Limpet, but I don’t think they’ll mistake the mural for that,” Bridgette answered. “I believe they’ll look upon it as a perfectly harmless pursuit meant to lighten the atmosphere of the neighborhood. They may even welcome it as a way to prove they’re not the monsters everybody knows them to be.”

“I thought the Germans hated art,” Victoria said. “They burned about five thousand paintings in Berlin in 1939.” The Nazi plunder of priceless works of art from German museums and their wholesale destruction was another atrocity ordered by Hitler that had made it to American newspapers.

“Those paintings represented modern art, Liverwort,” Bridgette explained. “My mural won’t have a stroke of expressionism in it. The Germans might even contribute their own touches, and if I know the artistic French, so will they, since the painting will be seen as a public display. It’s not a perfect plan, but at least it gives me a way of making contact with reasonable hope that it works. And like Lodestar pointed out, all of us have reason to have a natural interest in the wall.”