190
PARTISAN REVIEW
which I doubt-events are now taking place that fill me with
consternation.
For a long time Aunt Milla has been famous in our family
for her delight in decorating the Christmas tree, a harmless though
particularized weakness which is fairly widespread in our country.
This
weakness of hers was indulgently smiled at by one and all, and
the resistance that Franz showed from
his
earliest days to this "non–
sense" was treated with indignation, especially since Franz was in
other respects a disturbing young man. He refused to take part in the
decoration of the tree. Up to a certain point all this was taken
in
stride. My aunt had become accustomed to Franz's staying away from
the preparations at Advent and also from the celebration itself and
only putting in an appearance for the meal. It was not even
mentioned.
At the risk of making myself unpopular, I must here mention
a fact in defense of which I can only say that it really is a fact. In
the years 1939 to 1945 we were at war. In war there is singing,
shooting, oratory, fighting, starvation and death-and bombs are
dropped. These are thoroughly disagreeable subjects, and I have no
desire to bore my contemporaries by dwelling on them. I must only
mention them because the war had an influence on the story I am
about to tell. For the war registered on my aunt simply as a force
that, as early as Christmas 1939, began to threaten her Christmas
tree. To be sure, this tree of hers was peculiarly sensitive.
As
its principal attraction my Aunt Milia's Christmas tree was
furnished with glass gnomes that held cork hammers in their upraised
hands. At their feet were bell-shaped anvils, and under their feet
candles were fastened. When the heat rose to a certain degree, a
hidden mechanism went into operation, imparting a hectic movement
to the gnomes' arms; a dozen in number, they beat like mad on the
bell-shaped anvils with their cork hammers, thus producing a con–
certed, high-pitched, elfin tinkling. And at the top of the tree stood
a red-cheeked angel, dressed in silver, who at certain intervals opened
his lips and whispered "Peace, peace." The mechanical secret of the
angel was strictly guarded, and I only learned about it later, when
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with sugar
rings,
cookies, angel hair, mal"l.ipan figures and, not to
