Cambridge, MA, 1914: Helen Windship Brooks, the precocious
daughter of the prestigious Boston family, is struggling to find herself at the
renowned Harvard-Radcliffe university when carefree British playboy, Riley
Spencer, and his brooding German poet-cousin, Wils Brandl, burst into her
sheltered world. As Wils quietly helps the beautiful, spirited Helen navigate
Harvard, they fall for each other against a backdrop of tyrannical professors,
intellectual debates, and secluded boat rides on the Charles River.
But with foreign tensions mounting and the country teetering on
the brink of World War I, German-born Wils finds his future at Harvard—and in
America—increasingly in danger. When both cousins are called to fight on
opposing sides of the same war, Helen must decide if she is ready to fight her
own battle for what she loves most.
Based on the true story behind a mysterious and
controversial World War I memorial at this world-famous university, The End of
Innocence sweeps readers from the elaborate elegance of Boston's high society
to Harvard's hallowed halls to Belgium's war-ravaged battlefields, offering a
powerful and poignant vision of love and hope in the midst of a violent, broken
world.
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Allegra Jordan is a writer and global innovation
consultant. A graduate with honors of Harvard Business School, she led
marketing at USAToday.com for four years and has taught innovation in sixteen
countries and five continents.
Connect with Allegra Jordan
Website - http://allegrajordan.com/
Twitter – https://twitter.com/allegrajordan1
Praise for End of Innocence
"This engaging debut from Jordan tells the love
story of two college students who pursue their romance as World War I
begins."
"Jordan does a terrific job of contrasting the
superficial formalities of the initial chapters depicting New England social
life with the grueling realities of life in the trenches. Also on display is
her knack for taking what at first seem like throwaway or background details
and making them central to the story's last third..."
"A thoughtful look at a turning point in world
history.”
Helen is a sympathetic and complicated main character.
Her strengths and weaknesses keep the reader's attention, making this a
worthwhile read." - Kirkus
"A thoughtful work that offers an interesting
perspective on the period." - Booklist
"Reminiscent of Jacqueline Winspear's Maise Dobbs
books without the mystery, this novel explores the complications involved when
war becomes personal. Jordan builds empathetic characters and an intriguing
story. Library Journal " - Library Journal
"Allegra Jordan's The End of Innocence is a moving
ode to a lost generation. With lyrical prose and rich historical detail, Jordan
weaves a tale in which love overcomes fear, hope overcomes despair, and the
indelible human spirit rises up to embrace renewal and reconciliation in the
face of loss and destruction." - Allison Pataki, New York Times
bestselling author of The Traitor's Wife
"Love in a time of war....surely there is no more
compelling or romantic theme in all of literature Yet this fine debut novel
appeals to the brain as well as the heart. Allegra Jordan brings us historical
fiction at its best." - Lee Smith, New York Times bestselling author of
Guests on Earth and The Last Girls
"A delicious, well-crafted historical novel."
- Daniel Klein, NYT best-selling co-author of PLATO and A PLATYPUS WALKS INTO A
BAR
"Downton Abbey has found a brilliant successor in
this spellbinding tale of love, death, and war. The finest war fiction to be
published in many years." - Jonathan W. Jordan, bestselling author of
Brothers, Rivals, Victors
"An exquisitely beautiful novel." - William
Ferris, UNC-Chapel Hill professor and former chair of the National Endowment
for the Humanities
Harvard Yard
Wednesday, August 26, 1914
It was said
that heroic architects didn't fare well in Harvard Yard. If you wanted haut
monde, move past the Johnston Gate, preferably to New York. The Yard was
Boston's: energetic, spare, solid.
The Yard had
evolved as a collection of buildings, each with its own oddities, interspersed
among large elm trees and tracts of grass. The rich red brickwork of Sever Hall
stood apart from the austere gray of University Hall. Appleton Chapel's
Romanesque curves differed from the gabled turrets of Weld and the sharp peaks
of Matthews. Holworthy, Hollis, and Stoughton were as plain as the Pilgrims.
Holden Chapel, decorated with white cherubs above its door and tucked in a
corner of the Yard, looked like a young girl's playhouse. The red walls of
Harvard and Massachusetts halls, many agreed, could be called honest but not
much more. The massive new library had been named for a young man who went down
on the Titanic two years before. There were those who would've had the
architect trade tickets with the young lad. At least the squat form, dour
roofline, and grate of Corinthian columns did indeed look like a library.
The Yard had
become not a single building demanding the attention of all around it but the
sum of its parts: its many irregular halls filled with many irregular people.
Taken together over the course of nearly three hundred years, this endeavor of
the Puritans was judged a resounding success by most. In fact, none were
inclined to think higher of it than those forced to leave Harvard, such as the
bespectacled Wilhelm von Lützow Brandl, a senior and the only son of a Prussian
countess, at that hour suddenly called to return to Germany.
A soft rain
fell in the Yard that day, but Wils seemed not to notice. His hands were
stuffed in his trouser pockets; his gait slowed as the drops dampened his
crested jacket, spotted his glasses, and wilted his starched collar. The dying
elms, bored to their cores by a plague of leopard moths, provided meager cover.
He looked
out to the Yard. Men in shirtsleeves and bowler hats carried old furniture and
stacks of secondhand books into their dormitories. This was where the poor
students lived. But the place had a motion, an energy. These Americans found no
man above them except that he prove it on merit, and no man beneath them except
by his own faults. They believed that the son of a fishmonger could match the
son of a count and proved it with such regularity that an aristocrat like Wils
feared for the future of the wealthy class.
He sighed,
looking over the many faces he would never know. Mein Gott. He ran his hands
through his short blond hair. I'll miss this.
His mother
had just wired demanding his return home. He pulled out the order from his
pocket and reread it. She insisted that for his own safety he return home as
soon as possible. She argued that Boston had been a hotbed of intolerance for
more than three hundred years, and now news had reached Berlin that the
American patriots conspired to send the German conductor of the Boston Symphony
to a detention camp in the state of Georgia. That city was no place for her son.
She was
understandably distressed, although he was certain the reports in Germany made
the situation sound worse than it was. The papers there would miss that Harvard
was welcoming, for instance. If the front door at Harvard was closed to a
student due to his race, class, or nationality, inevitably a side door opened
and a friend or professor would haul him back inside by his collar. Once a
member of the club, always a member.
But Boston
was a different matter. Proud, parochial, and hostile, Boston was a suspicious
place filled with suspicious people. It was planned even in pre-Revolutionary
times to convey-down to the last missing signpost-"If you don't know where
you are in Boston, what business do you have being here?" And they meant
it. Wils kept his distance from Boston.
Wils
crumpled the note in his hand and stuffed it into his pocket, then walked
slowly to his seminar room in Harvard Hall, opened the door, and took an empty
seat at the table just as the campus bell tolled.
The room was
populated with twenty young men, their books, and a smattering of their sports
equipment piled on the floor behind their chairs. After three years together in
various clubs, classes, or sports, they were familiar faces. Wils recognized
the arrogant mien of Thomas Althorp and the easy confidence of John Eliot, the
captain of the football team. Three others were in the Spee Club, a social
dining group Wils belonged to. One was a Swede, the other two from England.
The tiny,
bespectacled Professor Charles Townsend Copeland walked to the head of the
table. He wore a tweed suit and a checked tie and carried a bowler hat in his
hand along with his notes. He cast a weary look over them as he placed his
notes on the oak lectern.
The lectern
was new with an updated crest, something that seemed to give Copeland pause.
Wils smiled as he watched his professor ponder it. The crest was carved into
the wood and painted in bright gold, different from those now-dulled ones
painted on the backs of the black chairs in which they sat. The old crest spoke
of reason and revelation: two books turned up, one turned down. The latest
version had all three books upturned. Apparently you could-and were expected
to-know everything by the time you left Harvard.
It would
take some time before the crest found its way into all the classrooms and
halls. Yankees were not ones to throw anything out, Wils had learned. He had
been told more than once that two presidents and three generals had used this
room and the chairs in which they sat. Even without this lore, it still wasn't
easy to forget such lineage, as the former occupants had a way of becoming
portraits on the walls above, staring down with questioning glares. They were
worthy-were you?
Professor
Copeland called the class to order with a rap at the podium. "You are in
Advanced Composition. If you intend to compose at a beginning or intermediate
level, I recommend you leave."
He then ran
through the drier details of the class. Wils took few notes, having heard this
speech several times before.
"In
conclusion," Copeland said, looking up from his notes, "what wasn't
explained in the syllabus is a specific point of order with which Harvard has
not dealt in some time. This seminar started with thirty-two students. As you
see, enrollment is now down to twenty, and the registrar has moved us to a
smaller room.
"This
reduction is not due to the excellent quality of instruction, which I can
assure you is more than you deserve. No. This new war calls our young men to it
like moths to the flame. And as we know moths are not meant to live in such
impassioned conditions, and we can only hope that the war's fire is
extinguished soon.
"If you
do remain in this class, and on this continent, I expect you to write with
honesty and clarity. Organize your thoughts, avoid the bombastic, and shun
things you cannot possibly know.
"Mr.
Eliot, I can ward off sleep for only so long when you describe the ocean's
tide. Mr. Brandl, you will move me beyond the comfort of tearful frustration if
you write yet another essay about something obscure in Plato. Mr. Althorp, your
poems last semester sounded like the scrapings of a novice violinist. And Mr.
Goodwin, no more discourses on Milton's metaphors. It provokes waves of acid in
my stomach that my doctor says I can no longer tolerate."
Wils had now
heard the same tirade for three years and the barbs no longer stung. As
Copeland rambled, Wils's mind wandered back to the telegram in his pocket.
Though a dutiful son, he wanted to argue against his mother's demands, against
duty, against, heaven forbid, the philosophy of Kant. His return to Germany
would be useless. The situation was not as intolerable as his mother believed.
These were his classmates. He had good work to accomplish. The anti-German
activity would abate if the war were short-and everyone said it would be.
"Brandl!"
Copeland was standing over him.
"Sir?"
"Don't
be a toad. Pay attention."
"Yes,
sir."
"Come
to Hollis 15 after class, Mr. Brandl."
Thomas
snickered. "German rat."
Wils cast a
cold stare back.
When the
Yard's bell tolled the hour, Professor Copeland closed his book and looked up
at the class. "Before you go-I know some of you may leave this very day to
fight in Europe or to work with the Red Cross. Give me one last word."
His face,
stern for the past hour of lecturing, softened. He cleared his throat. "As
we have heard before and will hear again, there is loss in this world, and we
shall feel it, if not today, then tomorrow, or the week after that. That is the
way of things. But there is also something equal to loss that you must not
forget. There is an irrepressible renewal of life that we can no more stop than
blot out the sun. This is a good and encouraging thought.
"Write
me if you go to war and tell me what you see. That's all for today." And
with that the class was dismissed.
* * *
Wils opened
the heavy green door of Hollis Hall and dutifully walked up four flights of
steps to Professor Copeland's suite. He knocked on a door that still bore the
arms of King George III. Copeland, his necktie loosened at the collar, opened
the door.
"Brandl.
Glad I saw you in class. We need to talk."
"Yes,
Professor. And I need your advice on something as well."
"Most
students do." The professor ushered Wils inside.
The smell of
stale ash permeated the room. The clouds cast shadows into the sitting area
around the fireplace. Rings on the ceiling above the glass oil lamps testified
to Copeland's refusal of electricity for his apartment. The furniture-a worn
sofa and chairs-bore the marks of years of students' visits. A pitcher of water
and a scotch decanter stood on a low table, an empty glass beside them.
Across the
room by the corner windows, Copeland had placed a large desk and two wooden
chairs. Copeland walked behind the desk, piled high with news articles, books,
and folders, and pointed Wils to a particularly weathered chair in front of
him, in which rested a stack of yellowing papers, weighted by a human skull of
all things. Copeland had walked by it as if it were a used coffee cup.
"One of
ours?" asked Brandl, as he moved the skull and papers respectfully to the
desk.
The severe
exterior of Copeland's face cracked into a smile. "No. I'm researching
Puritans. They kept skulls around. Reminded them to get on with it. Not dawdle.
Fleeting life and all."
"Oh
yes. ‘Why grin, you hollow skull-'"
"Please
keep your Faust to yourself, Wils. But I do need to speak to you on that
subject."
"Faust?"
"No,
death," said Copeland. His lips tightened as he seemed to be weighing his
words carefully. His face lacked any color or warmth now. "Well, more
about life before death."
"Mine?"
asked Wils.
"No.
Maximilian von Steiger's life before his death."
"What
the devil? Max...he, he just left for the war. He's dead?"
Copeland
leaned toward him across the desk. "Yes, Maximilian von Steiger is dead.
And no, he didn't leave. Not in the corporeal sense. All ocean liners bound for
Germany have been temporarily held, pending the end of the conflict in
Europe."
Wils's eyes
met Copeland's. "What do you mean?"
"Steiger
was found dead in his room."
"Fever?"
"Noose."
Wils's eyes
stung. His lips parted, but no sound came out. "You are sure?"
As Copeland
nodded, Wils suddenly felt nauseous, his collar too tight. He had known Max
nearly all his life. They lived near each other back in Prussia; they attended
the same church and went to the same schools. Their mothers were even good
friends. Wils loosened his tie.
"May I
have some water, please, Professor?" Wils finally asked in a raspy voice.
As Copeland turned his back to him, Wils took a deep breath, pulled out a linen
handkerchief, and cleaned the fog from his spectacles.
The
professor walked over to a nearby table and poured a glass of water. "How
well did you know Max?" he asked, handing the glass to Wils.
He took the
tumbler and held it tight, trying to still his shaking hand. "We met at
church in Prussia when we were in the nursery. I've known him forever."
"Did
you know anything about any gaming debts that he'd incurred?"
Debts?
"No."
"Do you
think that gaming debts were the cause of his beating last week?" asked
Copeland, sitting back in his desk chair.
Wils moved
to the edge of his seat. The prügel? Last Wednesday's fight flashed into his
mind. There had been a heated argument between Max and a very drunk Arnold
Archer after dinner at the Spee dining club. Max had called him a coward for
supporting the British but not being willing to fight for them. It wasn't the
most sensible thing to do given Archer ran with brawny, patriotic friends. On
Thursday at the boathouse Max had received the worst of a fight with Archer's
gang.
"It was
a schoolboys' fight. They were drunk. Max was beaten because Arnold Archer was
mad about the Germans beating the British in Belgium. Archer couldn't fight
because America's neutral, so he hit a German who wouldn't renounce his
country. These fights break out all the time over politics when too much brandy
gets in the way. People get over their arguments."
"Didn't
Max make some nationalistic speech at the Spee Club?"
Wils's back
stiffened in indignation. "If Max had been British it would have gone
unnoticed. But because he was German, Archer beat him." He paused.
"Max was going to tell the truth as he knew it, and thugs like Archer
weren't going to stop him."
Copeland
tapped a pencil against his knee. "How well do you think his strategy
worked?"
Wils's eyes
widened. "Being beaten wasn't Max's fault, Professor. It was the fault of the
person who used his fists."
"Wils,
Arnold Archer's father is coming to see me this evening to discuss the case.
His son is under suspicion for Max's death."
"I hope
Arnold goes to jail."
"Arnold
may not have been involved."
Wils set the
glass down on the wooden desk and stood up. "He's a pig."
"Wils,
according to Arnold, Max tried to send sensitive information about the
Charlestown Navy Yard to Germany." A faint tinge of pink briefly colored
the professor's cheeks. "Arnold said he knew about this and was going to
go to the police. Max may have thought that he would go to jail for endangering
the lives of Americans and British citizens. And if what Arnold said was right,
then Max may have faced some very serious consequences."
"America's
not at war."
The
professor didn't respond.
"Why
would Max do such a thing then?" asked Wils curtly.
"Arnold
says he was blackmailed because of his gaming debts."
"What
could Max possibly have found? He's incapable of remembering to brush his hair
on most days."
Copeland
threw up his hands, nearly tipping over a stack of books on the desk. "I
have no idea. Maybe America's building ships for England. Maybe we've captured
a German ship. Apparently he found something. Sometime later, Max was found by
his maid, hung with a noose fashioned from his own necktie. His room was a
wreck." Copeland looked at him intently. "And now the police don't
know if it was suicide or murder. Arnold might have wanted to take matters into
his own hands-as he did the other night after the Spee Club incident."
Wils ran his
hands through his hair. "Arnold a murderer? It just doesn't make sense. It
was a schoolboys' fight. And Arnold's a fool, but much more of a village idiot
than a schemer."
"Don't
underestimate him, Wils. He's not an idiot. He's the son of a very powerful
local politician who wants to run for higher office. His father holds City Hall
in his pocket."
"Are
you speaking of Boston City Hall?"
"Yes."
"I
could care less about some martinet from Boston. I'm related to half the
monarchs in Europe." Wils sneered.
"City
Hall has more power over you right now than some king in a faraway land,"
said Copeland. "Arresting another German, maybe stopping a German spy
ring-that would be exactly the thing that could get a man like Charles Archer
elected to Congress. I'd recommend you cooperate with City Hall on any
investigation into Max's death. If you have information, you will need to share
it."
"If
Arnold killed Max-" He stopped, barely able to breathe. Max dead by
Arnold's hand? Unthinkable. "Was there a note?"
"No,
nothing. That's why the Boston police may arrest Archer even if his father does
run City Hall. Either it was a suicide and it won't happen again, or perhaps we
need to warn our German students about...a problem." Copeland's fingers
brushed the edge of his desk. "That was the point of my summoning you here
now. It could've been suicide. Therefore, the police want to talk with you
before innocent people are accused, and I'd recommend you do it."
But Wils had
already taken the bait. "Innocent people? Arnold Archer? Is this a
joke?" asked Wils.
"He may
not be guilty."
Wils paused.
"I'm not sure how much money his father's giving Harvard, but it had
better be a lot."
"That's
most uncharitable!"
"And so
is the possible murder of a decent human! Where's Professor Francke? I'd like
to speak with him. He is a great German leader here on campus whom everyone
respects. He'll know how to advise me."
"You
are right. Professor Francke is a moderate, respected voice of reason. But he's
German and the police questioned him this morning. He is cooperating. His ties
to the kaiser have naturally brought him under suspicion. City Hall thinks he
could be a ringleader of a band of German spies. The dean of students asked me
to speak with you and a few others prior to your discussions with the police.
They should contact you shortly regarding this unpleasantness."
"If
that is all-" Wils bowed his head to leave, anger rising in his throat
from the injustice of what he'd heard. First murder and now harassment were
being committed against his countrymen, and somehow they were to blame for it?
Not possible. Professor Francke was one of the most generous and beloved
professors at Harvard. Max was a harmless soul.
"Wils,
you had said you wished to ask me about something."
Wils thought
back to his mother's telegram. Perhaps she'd been right to demand his return
after all. He looked up at Copeland, sitting under an image of an old Spanish
peasant. He seemed to have shrunk in his large desk chair.
"No,
Professor. Nothing at all. Good day."
Copeland
didn't rise as Wils turned to enter the dimly lit hallway. As his eyes
adjusted, a famous poem Copeland had taught him in class-Matthew Arnold's
"Dover Beach"-came to him. Wils turned back to his teacher and said:
"For
the world, which seems
To lie
before us like a land of dreams,
So various,
so beautiful, so new,
Hath really
neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor
certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are
here as on a darkling plain-"
Copeland
brightened. "‘Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, where
ignorant armies clash by night,'" they finished together. Wils nodded,
unable to speak further.
"Matthew
Arnold has his moments. Do take care, Wils. Stay alert. I am concerned about
you and want you to be safe. The world is becoming darker just now. Your
intellectual light is one worth preserving. Now please close the door from the
outside." Copeland looked down again, and the interview was over.
* * *
The rain had
driven the students inside their dormitories and flooded the walkways in
Harvard Yard. As Wils left Hollis Hall, he removed his tie and pushed it into
his pocket. The damned Americans talk brotherhood, he thought, but if you're
from the wrong side of Europe you're no brother to them.
Max dead.
Arnold Archer under suspicion. And what was all of that ridiculous nonsense
about the Charlestown Navy Yard, he wondered, deep in thought, nearly walking
into a large blue mailbox. He crossed the busy street and walked toward his
room in Beck Hall.
In his mind,
he saw Max trading barbs at the dinner table and laughing at the jests of
Wils's roommate, Riley, an inveterate prankster. And how happy Max had been
when Felicity, his girlfriend from Radcliffe College, had agreed to go with him
to a dance. But he'd been utterly heartbroken when she deserted him last year
for a senior. This past summer Wils and Max had walked along the banks of the
Baltic, when they were back in Europe for summer vacation. He said he would
never get over her and he never really had. So what had happened to him?
Anger at the
injustice of Max's death welled up inside Wils as he opened the arched door of
Beck Hall and walked quickly past Mr. Burton's desk. The housemaster didn't
look up from his reading. Wils shut the door to his room behind him. His breath
was short. His hands hadn't stopped trembling. He had to find Riley and discuss
what to do about Arnold.
What was
happening to his world? His beautiful, carefully built world was cracking.
Germany and Britain at war? Max dead? Professor Francke hauled in and
questioned?
Wils felt a
strange fury welling up inside of him. He wanted something to hurt as badly as
he did. He picked up a porcelain vase and hurled it against the brick
fireplace. It crashed and shattered, the blue-and-white shards scattering over
the crimson rug.
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