510
PARTISAN REVIEW
It was, rather, a thing at first hardly noticeable, but very striking
once it was seen: the host's collection of corks was bound to attract
and hold the attention of anyone.
The collection consisted of little figures, some very old and valu–
able, mounted on cork stoppers and equipped with pins. They were
usually kept in a glass case, stuck in the velvet lining; but now they
were scattered
all
over the room, singly or in groups, on mirror frames,
upholstered chair backs and along the sideboard, a gay and unreal
company, a circle of impertinent little dolls that seemed unwilling
to budge before the invader. Here a Fortuna, throwing back her
curly head and gazing teasingly over her shoulder at a bearded goat,
standing miserably on
his
hind feet and straining to reach the fruits
of the cornucopia; there two figures, dancing together in a lewd
embrace; or a beautiful contorted dog licking himself under the
tail, and a big-bellied Silenus seriously deliberating why the wine
could not just as well spurt from his prominent phallus as from the
neck of the bottle.
No one but the host could have indulged in this prank and de–
ployed the little figures about the room. Only he had the key to
the case, and he disposed of it with a jealousy that enhanced Johan–
na's feeling of timidity, so deeply ingrained in her anyway as a new–
comer, with regard to her husband's eccentricities or his family heir–
looms. He had only a few such privileges, however, and rather than
flaunt them he tried to conceal them-just as he had tried to conceal
his wife's pregnancy longer than she herself, whose nature was open
and passionate, yielding to restraint only when faced with the male
mysteries, whether of property or procreation.
Perhaps he had played with his collection, as he often did
in
his leisure, and forgotten to put the figures back in their place. Or
perhaps, acting out, through them, an old dream, he had deliberately
placed them within reach of the guests-to see who would be play–
thing and who player. In any case, Johanna left them where they
were when she aired the parlor, removed the covers from the cushions,
and wound the mechanical piano which, upon insertion of a' penny,
would play
Annchen von Tharau.
Arms crossed under her breast,
she had for perhaps the first time consciously examined her husband's
collection and, besides being impressed with their value, she had ex–
perienced a vague desire to destroy them, a stir of jealousy which
