The End of Innocence

by Allegra Jordan

  Yet his bitterness toward the events of the last few years came through in caustic talk or a wall of silence. She preferred his silence.

  And that is what she got. They drove without another word back to Boston and Beacon Hill, where she now lived. When she was about to get out of the car he cleared his throat.

  “One last thing. I know this will do no good, but Ann told me President Lowell just hired a new engineering professor: Robert Brown.”

  “Robert Brown of Lexington?” She’d not seen him in years.

  “Yes. The one who everyone wanted you to marry.”

  “But he did marry and move to California after the war.”

  “Ann said his wife died a few years ago, and that President Lowell persuaded him to move back. Ann thought perhaps we should pay a call on him. Unless you wish to sabotage this meeting like you have the others.”

  She ignored him as she got out of the car.

  “Helen, Ann says he was wounded at the Somme, and by his wife’s death.”

  She straightened her shoulders. “I’m certain Robert doesn’t believe in second marriages, and I don’t either.”

  “Then he would be a perfect friend for you.” He shook his head and drove off without another word as she turned to her house on Chestnut Street.

  * * *

  Chestnut Street on Beacon Hill was a good part of Boston for a woman of thirty-five to live by herself. The spinster figure was a welcome staple in those parts. Helen’s town house was situated up near its peak, across from the bustle of the Boston Common, near the State House, and most importantly, close to her beloved Boston Athenaeum. Proximity to this private library had kept her from her brother’s mistake of moving onto Commonwealth Avenue, a commodious and crowded boulevard designed to look like Paris’s Champs-Élysées.

  Boston was not Paris. It was a city for insiders, the insiders felt, and the concept extended from the private gardens, drawing rooms, libraries, and clubs for the rich to the narrow, twisting, one-way streets. Ample space was provided for the public weal: a symphony, library, garden, and common, as well as numerous churches and sports venues. Yet the heart of Boston could not be broad avenues attempting to imitate a city known for frivolity and light. Her father had never understood why Peter and Ann would choose the inconvenience of Commonwealth Avenue, no matter how many crystal chandeliers one could stuff in a mansion. He never could quite shake the feeling that the tenor of the town had shifted toward the commercial and trivial since the war. In her father’s eyes, that was a loss for Boston and, thus, a loss for mankind.

  Her father had relented on her desire to move to Beacon Hill when he was faced with the Commonwealth Avenue alternative, or worse, near the student tenements in Cambridge. Before his death, he’d made clear that he approved of her residence only in the nearby allure of 10½ Beacon Street, the home of the Athenaeum. In a library members weren’t supposed to talk, so his daughter would not be bothered with the frivolous social diversions he so disliked.

  She’d spent many days in the Athenaeum’s reading room, working, researching, and, at times, pretending to read while looking out against the tall bank of windows overlooking the Granary Burying Ground. From her chair she could watch the tree leaves spend the summer and fall on the graves of Paul Revere and John Hancock. In the winter the snow would outline the trees’ dark and wet branches. The shrill wind was kept out by the length of buildings along the burying ground’s two sides, creating a quiet haven in the center of the city. It felt so familiar that it was sometimes hard to believe she was not back in Lexington in her father’s old study, looking up from a manuscript and into his garden.

  After she was through, she would walk to her house on Chestnut Street. Hers was in the middle of a row of brick town houses that sat across from a nearly identical row of town houses on the other side of the street. They had flat roofs and three narrow floors, black shutters at each window, and doors painted black. Flower boxes were in a few windows, and slender trees punctuated the walks—chestnut, linden, honey locust.

  Helen found her neighborhood met every need she had. It was neither overwhelming nor too small. It was not too public nor too private. It was just right.

  Each evening as she returned she would check for her mail in the polished brass box, unlock her door, and enter into her spotless parlor. She’d walk to her kitchen and sit at a small table, reading her mail while eating the meal she’d picked up at the grocer’s on Charles Street—boiled beef, some carrots, an apple, and a glass of milk. Then she’d retire upstairs, unpinning her dark hair, brushing it out, and changing into her nightgown with the long lace cuffs.

  Before she went to sleep, she’d often open a drawer beside her nightstand and touch a packet of yellowing letters. It was just a fleeting touch, more a vestige of a prior time than anything else. The addresses, the ink from the censor’s marks, and the coloring on the stamps had faded.

  She touched the letters or sometimes just looked at them. That small sacramental act at times used to calm her. But its impact had faded just like the ink. After so many years, Wils Brandl was more a hazy memory than a real person. One could not survive on memory alone.

  Or anger. She’d been quite angry. They’d had such promise—the stupid German kaiser had kept Wils from keeping a sacred promise! Helen knew this fury was not rational. Nor was her guilt—could she have prevented him going? Both the anger and guilt had lasted a few years, during which time any number of suitors Ann and Peter suggested were unthinkable. Eventually her grief became lethargy. She was tempted at points by young men in her path, but she never had the energy to risk her heart again. Peter said she was a keen saboteur. She didn’t care.

  One could be faithful, she felt. Fidelity showed character.

  In truth, her isolation hadn’t happened overnight. It set in through the years as she kept to the path she knew. After all, in her opinion, it was an honorable path. She’d made a promise before God to love her husband forever—and it was a promise she intended to keep.

  Die Liebe welche Gott geweiht, Die bleibet bis in Ewigkeit.

  The love which God consecrates abides for eternity.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Hollis Hall

  Cambridge, Massachusetts

  The next morning, during a break in her work at the library, Helen walked across the Yard, buffeted by a brisk wind under a bright sun. She pulled her hat farther down around her ears while brittle leaves scurried ahead of her as if in a game of hopscotch. She hoped to find the old man of Hollis 15 before he left for his lunch.

  As Helen walked up the flights of steps to his room, she wondered just how the aged professor could make this climb several times a day. At the top, she was out of breath, and she was only thirty-five. She took off her wool topcoat and draped it over her arm before knocking on the door.

  A shuffling came from inside. Professor Copeland, a tiny man, now stooped with age, opened it. He stood before her in an oversized tweed suit, and his face wore a sour look.

  “Yes?” he said. His spectacles were so thick they resembled fishbowls and magnified the sagging skin on his cheeks.

  “Professor Copeland, it’s Helen Brooks, from the library.”

  He paused, clearly trying to place her name, but didn’t open the door farther. “The library?”

  Helen was disappointed he didn’t recognize her. She had heard rumors that his mind was not what it used to be. “Yes. But I’ve come to see you about a different matter. A museum is collecting letters.”

  “I have no appointment at nine fifty-five for Harriet Brown. Come back when you have scheduled with my secretary,” he said with a cough and began to close the door.

  “But, sir, I’m not Harriet Brown. She’s the reference librarian. And I need to speak with you. Do you not remember me? I’m a former student of yours.”

  “You can’t have my books. I got an extension. They’re not
overdue. Please remove your foot from my door.”

  “It’s not about books. You’ve confused me, sir. I’m Helen Brooks, Jonathan’s daughter and a former student of yours. I’ve come to ask about a German student who you taught, Wilhelm Brandl. Remember Wils? He was a German poet from back in 1914,” she added, hoping that would spark his memory.

  He gave her a careful look. “Helen? Helen Brooks? Of course. My apologies. Of course I remember you. And Wils too. Come back at ten o’clock, punctually. I’ll talk with you then,” he said, closing the door abruptly in her face.

  Helen raised her hand to pound on the door once again, but then she caught herself. After seventeen years, she could wait another five minutes.

  How he’d survived in his old age up these steps and with a fading memory, she had no idea.

  When ten o’clock chimed, Professor Copeland came back and opened the door promptly.

  “Ah! Miss Brooks! Please come in,” he offered, and ushered her in. The sun filled the room, adding a golden touch to the yellowing piles of students’ papers on his massive desk. On the floor rested stacks of books, their overdue notices crumpled beside them, Helen noted with a smile.

  “I’m having these carted to the library tomorrow to Miss Harriet Brown, it turns out. Not to you, Miss Brooks,” he said nonchalantly, offering her a seat on his sofa. “Please sit down.” A cut glass decanter with the word “Scotch” around its elegant neck rested on the table. It was nearly empty.

  “What is it about Wils Brandl, Miss Brooks? I’ve not much life left in me. Please don’t make me use it waiting for you to get to the point.”

  Helen stiffened. She was no longer some young student to be bullied.

  “As you may have remembered back at that terrible time, Wils was beaten. We met in his hospital room.”

  “I do remember. As I recall I thought you two might have formed an attachment but never heard anything come of it.”

  “We did.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss. But that is not why I sent young Spencer to you after so many years.”

  “Why then?”

  “It’s a too common request for young boys these days to search for any scrap of paper their fathers touched. I sympathize but don’t know where those might be. My collection of letters is limited. I have the class rosters and I let them find what they can find. I gave Spencer’s son a list of people to contact who might have known his father either directly or through his cousin, not that there are many of those boys still alive, a regrettable fact. But any solace they can find is good solace. Some mothers in England I heard are still having séances to try to reach their dead sons. It’s pitiable. A scrap of paper I believe would be more tangible comfort than such practices.”

  “Professor, I admit, that I’m here with the same request as those young men.”

  “What?”

  “As you know, Professor, both Wils and Riley died in the war. I didn’t have any communications from Riley and I don’t have anything to offer his son. But in thinking about this, I realized I never asked you if you had any news from Wils during the war. Your famous collection of letters from young men at war could include one.”

  “My mind is not what it used to be, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. It comes and goes at the most inopportune times. But my memory about that time during the war is just fine. My collection of letters from former students at war is my greatest pride,” he said. “I know every letter in it. It has none from any Germans. Most professors around here who did receive correspondence from Germans burned the letters. At the time it was what the young men wanted. Things were not good for Germans during those days.”

  “Did you burn any?”

  “I said I don’t think I received any,” he said. He got up and slowly shuffled over to a shabby old trunk in the corner shadow. “I suppose I can look,” he said, lifting out a large red volume. “Ah! Here’s the first one.”

  Helen rushed to his side to help him carry the volumes. She noticed how much weight he’d lost. His outstretched arms seemed frail under the bulk of his ill-fitting jacket. Though he’d turned more curmudgeonly since they’d last met, she was sorry to see him looking so aged. She took the volume and two others like it to the table, moved the decanter to the mantel, and then sat down.

  He walked over to the sofa. “This book has the earliest letters,” he said, sitting beside her. He opened its pages slowly, and a smile flickered across his face. “These letters I received before I knew what I was doing. I don’t recall throwing any correspondence out, but there was a lot going on. I was grading piles of papers every day so that young men could get their marks before they left.”

  He continued turning the pages slowly. She pursed her lips, feeling impatient. Now that the book was in front of her, she wished he would flip faster.

  Copeland grumbled. “Here, Helen, read this one.” He looked at her. “It’s short. You’ll not miss any appointments on its behalf.”

  Barnwell Abbey

  Somerset

  February 27, 1915

  Dear Professor Copeland:

  I am home for a few days leave, a welcome change from whipping a part of Kitchener’s New Army into shape. For I am now a lieutenant in the Duke of Wellington’s West Riding Regiment. When we shall get to the front, no one knows. We hope before long to do our share in reducing the Germans to sanity.

  I was deeply touched by your note. I know what it means for you to take quill in hand. I hope when the day of stress comes, I shall prove worthy of your remembrance and of Harvard.

  Ever yours,

  J. T. Murray

  She felt her own heart brighten at seeing how happy he was to share the letters with her. She’d heard that many students had flocked to him over the years for advice and discussions, and here was the evidence.

  There were many more pages in the volume. Some were newspaper clippings; others came from students training in America, reporting from the front, or those painting in Europe. At one point his eyes lit on a telegram and his face darkened. Saddened, he looked away.

  “I sent that telegram after we lost Billy Meeker,” he said gruffly, turning the page.

  Toward the back of the final volume they opened, she found a folded note. It was signed “Harvard.” She looked up at Copeland. “Lionel Harvard?”

  “The only Harvard to attend Harvard,” he said with a nod. “Did you know him?”

  She shook her head, then opened the letter carefully. It was a copy of a letter sent to Lionel’s wife, Mary. She’d read a similar one.

  COPY

  17 Battn. Grenadier Guards

  B. E. Force.

  1st April, 1918

  Dear Mrs. Harvard,

  It is with feelings of very deepest regret that I write to offer you my sincerest condolences in your great and irreparable loss.

  Although I had only been commanding the battalion for three weeks, I had already formed the highest opinion of your husband as a soldier, and had given him command of a company.

  His quiet manner, competence, and gallantry in action were beyond all praise, and I feel I have lost a friend, and also one of the very best officers in my battalion.

  We have buried him in the French civilian cemetery in Boisleux-au-Mont, and I have had a white enamel wooden Cross erected so that his last resting place may remain sacred until such time as a more lasting memorial can be put up.

  He was killed during the morning of 30th March by a German minderwefer, and died instantly. The battalion was on the front line and was very heavily attacked by the Germans, and his whole company suffered very heavy casualties.

  His personal belongings and kit are now on their way home, but I am afraid they may take some time in transit.

  I hope you will allow me again to express to you my own personal sorrow at his death, and my grief for you.

  Yours sincerely,<
br />
  GORT

  She closed the letter slowly and put it back in its envelope. “It was such an awful time.”

  “Yes, it was,” he said, sitting back in his seat. His face was pale again. “A ghastly business.”

  “Did Mrs. Harvard give you the letter?”

  “No. The Harvard War Records Department did.”

  “That’s not possible. Harvard doesn’t keep personal correspondence.”

  He shrugged. “I guess you’re wrong on this account. I found it in the folder. Perhaps they requested it from England. You know, perhaps they can request Wils’s or Riley’s information as well. You should look into it.”

  “I have, no fewer than ten times,” she said quietly, getting up to replace the books.

  “Oh. Sorry to hear that. Tell me please, Miss Brooks, what was the nature of your attachment to Wils Brandl?”

  “We were married.”

  His eyes widened briefly behind his thick glasses. “Then you must also be interested in the church that President Lowell is building. The one that will honor Riley and other British students but will exclude Wils and others who fought for Germany.”

  “I’m not,” she said. “I do not involve myself in political matters.” She was disappointed. There were no letters from Wils here. It was a dead end. He had nothing.

  He gave a cough. “I would think that the people who knew Brandl might want to lift a finger and do something about his memory.” He paused and looked at her. “You know, people with considerable family influence.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t change President Lowell’s mind. He will not let us honor the German students at Harvard who fought for the kaiser. Many have tried.”

  “You haven’t tried. And here you are—both a former student and the wife of a German student. You can make a difference. If I recall now, Miss Brooks, your mother had considerable interest in political matters while you were here and would have relished this challenge.”