“They’re still only just ideas.” He relented, telling her all about the strategies they had in the United States, and how he was meeting industry figures here in an attempt to discuss whether Britain could, or should, implement similar practices. It was fascinating, and she finished her wine as they talked, although when he was about to refill her glass she placed her hand across the top, remembering what had happened when she hadn’t stayed alert enough to deny her attraction to Rupert, or strong enough to fend him off.

“And those books for the soldiers, tell me more about them?” she asked.

“The Armed Services Editions. There are several new titles each month; the first one wouldn’t mean much to you, but to us Americans it’s kind of a classic, The Education of Hyman Kaplan.”

“What’s it about?”

“This guy, an immigrant, trying to learn English in New York. He’s not very good at it, that’s what makes it so funny. It’s about his exploits.” Theo had laughter in his voice. “The writer is only a young guy who first published it as a series in The New Yorker.”

“It sounds like a very charming and amusing tale.”

“It is!” He leaned a little closer, turning serious. “The council I’m part of, the one publishing the ASEs, has a motto: ‘Books are weapons in the war of ideas,’ and it seems to have stuck.”

“You’re sold on the idea that books are weapons?” she asked.

“Certainly. And so is Roosevelt, it was his saying: ‘In this war, we know, books are weapons.’ Imagine it, you’re on a remote island—Malta, for example—and all you can do is wait. The heat’s intense, there’s no food, the men are restless . . . What are you gonna do?”

“Swim?” she said teasingly.

He laughed. “Read!”

“I know, you’re right,” she said with a smile.

“They’re hungry for information and ideals; truths they can hold in their hearts and minds. At the moment the men tear books into sections so they can share them.”

It made her think of William and the letters they’d exchanged while he was serving. He too had described books as sustaining soldiers’ lives in a way that nothing else could.

“Yes,” she said, staring into the fire, “everything in their lives is rationed, or a secret, or sacrificed. They’re bound to one another and their country, and the only freedom they still have is in the landscape of their minds.”

“Which writer said that?”

“Just me.” She would never understand what her brother had endured, yet she knew what characters he had for company, what settings would distract him, and what stories would sustain him when he most needed them. “Books might not always be a comfort, but they remind them of what it is to be human, and to love.”