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Frayn uses war imagery to convey how at the time the novel was set everyone was engrossed in the war and the danger it posed. Another falsity that Stephen believes is Keith’s father’s heroism. He is very proud of his father and boasts this to Stephen while believing that his father is in the secret service. We can find the ironic narratives in this instance because we know the truth. Sadly, the great war hero that Keith believes his father to be is actually on the front line, fighting in diabolical conditions. This is typical behaviour for a young boy of the time the novel was set and throughout history for that matter, as nearly every child sees their father as a higher being, who they aspire to be. In a nutshell, Stephen and Keith’s relationship is presented by the writer as imbalanced through the theme of class as Stephen is lower-class while Keith is very middle-class. An interesting viewpoint is that the inequality shown through the relationship could also be used by Frayn to symbolise Germany and England during World War 2.
To conclude, both authors convey the theme of mystery through their central protagonists in different ways. Frayn does this through the youthful minds of Stephen and Keith and how they perceives things to be slightly different from the truth such as Keith exclaiming that ‘My mother is a German spy’ without valid reasoning and as Jennifer Schuessler from The New York Times Book Review suggests, their relationship “spirals into questions of loyalty,