Elliot Barlow was a brave little man. He tried to describe the plot of The Kiss in Düsseldorf, the first of his parents’ Nazi-era novels. It was a valiant effort: not to make his parents sound like hacks; not to call their novels potboilers; not to be outmaneuvered by my uncles’ interruptions. The intrepid snowshoer began, unwisely, with the eponymous kiss. Two SA men are seen kissing each other during Hitler’s speech in Düsseldorf in 1932.

“A two-and-a-half-hour speech—what a kiss!” Uncle Martin declared.

“The SA stands for Sturmabteilung—the Nazi storm troopers,” Uncle Johan, ever the German teacher, explained.

“Ernst Röhm and Rudolf Hess were in the SA,” Uncle Martin offered. “Röhm and Hess were Freikorps guys originally, before they were Nazis—Martin Bormann was a Freikorps guy, too.”

“Right-wing nationalists, they were the bunch behind the stab-in-the-back legend,” Uncle Johan interjected. “Die Dolchstosslegende!” he cried, causing the startled emeritus to lose control of his knife and fork. Like everyone else, Grandaddy Lew hadn’t really been eating. He’d been picking through his casserole, searching in vain for something recognizable.

My mother was seated between Elliot Barlow and me. Under the table, I could see she’d taken his small hand and was holding it in her lap. They’d scarcely touched the beer they were sharing—their first one.

Whether the hand-holding had distracted the snowshoer, or his grasp of The Kiss in Düsseldorf had slipped away, Elliot suddenly said: “One of the SA men seen kissing during Hitler’s speech in Düsseldorf is murdered. His killer is alleged to be the SA man who kissed him. Soon other Nazi storm troopers are found murdered, but they never find the kissing killer—that’s the plot.”

“Ernst Röhm was co-founder and a leader of the Sturmabteilung,” Uncle Johan jumped in. “Röhm’s homosexuality was well known.”

“Hitler had Röhm killed because Röhm was a homosexual,” Uncle Martin emphatically stated.

“Röhm had fought on the Western Front—he was awarded an Iron Cross,” Uncle Johan explained.

“Röhm was wounded—he lost a piece of his nasal bone!” Uncle Martin wanted everyone to know.

“No nasal bones—not when we’re eating!” Aunt Abigail ordered.

“Or even when we’re not eating!” Aunt Martha chimed in. My aunts’ interest in the conversation had peaked when the kissing men were mentioned, and when the words homosexuality and homosexual were used. Each occasion caused Aunt Abigail and Aunt Martha to stare intently at the little English teacher.