The End of Innocence

by Allegra Jordan

“My mother’s at the contributions table,” said Helen, recovering. “Do you wish to contribute?”

  “I was just telling Frank, we hope she’s recovered from her excitement.”

  “She’s fine, thank you. Frank, I’m sorry to hear that your uncle died.”

  Frank bowed his head and thanked her for the condolences. After a few moments of silence, he spoke again. “Miss Brooks, I regret that we must leave, but Admiral Wilson said that he wished to meet Caroline. We’ll speak later?” he asked, nodding again to Helen as he whisked his fiancée away.

  Helen felt the tight boning of her dress cut into her side as she swallowed her anger, knowing he wouldn’t return. She looked at the clock to find she still had two hours of torture left to stand in their shadow. It was so humiliating.

  Oh, Frank, she thought, why not me?

  As she sat back in the tiny chair and arranged her white skirts, she felt the full weight of the room clucking, tut-tutting, and being overall put out about her mother’s outspokenness exhibited in such a public manner. It was one thing to read Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience. He was a former neighbor and it would have been inhospitable to ignore the work. But it was entirely another thing to actually abandon your family for a summer to put your immodest plans into practice. And if her mother just had to rebel, why couldn’t she do so by becoming a rogue census taker and not a sex merchant?

  “Say, are you Peter’s sister?”

  The voice startled her. The accent was British. She looked up to see a handsome young man with dark hair and intelligent, bright green eyes who introduced himself as Rhyland Cabot Spencer, from her brother’s crew team at Harvard. He lifted her silk-tasseled dance card.

  “May I claim this dance?” he said, writing his name in very large letters across the top half of the card.

  “You’ve just claimed three, Mr. Spencer.”

  “Why, so I have, but please call me Riley. It sounds Irish, and my very British father hates it,” he said with a conspiratorial smile as he took her gloved hand and lifted it close to his lips. “Dancing with you keeps me out of the clutches of your brother, my crew captain, and, if I might say so, a homely fellow to have such a lovely sister. He’d have me rowing tonight if I weren’t otherwise occupied. So since the fairest lady here is seated right before me, I thought I’d make a bold move and ask her to dance.”

  She gave a light laugh, almost involuntarily. What a charming young man—tall, fair-skinned, with high and delicate cheekbones. When he grinned his entire face lit up.

  Suddenly a flash of recognition came upon her and she paused. “Just a moment. Aren’t you the one who called my brother a ‘dim-witted fright of a bink’ in front of hundreds at the Princeton race?”

  “Miss Brooks, such language!” He laughed as she stood. “Peter threw me in the Charles River for that one. It was absolute hell getting that smell out of my hair. I paid dearly for such disrespect, and it hasn’t happened again. Rather, I’d prefer to be known as the one who offered his assistance helping you move into Radcliffe tomorrow.”

  “How did you know I’m moving tomorrow?”

  “You didn’t think Peter was going to move those boxes, did you? He acts like royalty now that he’s the crew team captain.”

  “He wore that crown long before he got to Harvard,” she said with a smile as she set her purse on the table, abandoning it for the dance.

  Those poor British boys fighting in Belgium, she thought as he placed his arm firmly around her waist.

  This was the very least she could do for the war effort.

  * * *

  Wils squinted at his cousin Riley from across the dance floor. He’d lent Riley one of his formal suits for the evening, as his cousin’s other white jacket had been smeared with a woman’s rouge. Riley looked absolutely terrible in the borrowed clothes, but it hadn’t impeded his typical progress—he was already asking a pretty young woman to dance. Women never learned.

  Wils shook his head and walked over to a small table in the corner of the dance hall. The orchestra launched into a reel and all that silk and lace began spinning around the room.

  He adjusted his spectacles as a service boy came by with a tray holding several flutes of champagne. He took one and sipped it. Quite refreshing. It was probably the only thing to work off last night’s champagne headache. Gesundheit, he thought glumly and drained it.

  Wils sat back in the little gilt chair as the delicate bubbly dulled his misery. He, in contrast to his cousin, had no one to dance with despite being dressed impeccably in his own white jacket and white tie that he had brought from Berlin. His dark pants were perfectly tailored and his short blond hair neatly cropped. Even more unlike his cousin Riley, he wished he were far away from the dance and from all people.

  With his long fingers he drew a W in the condensation on the empty flute. Why his Aunt Frieda married an Englishman he had never understood. And why he looked after Riley, he often forgot. Habit, he guessed.

  He gazed out into the whirl of dancers, twirling against a backdrop of velvet curtains and gold tassels. They looked so pleasant, these Bostonians. That is, until they fingered you for a German spy. Then the whole lot would up and have you in jail. He secured another flute and tossed it back.

  It occurred to him that he should be, in fact, with Riley at Beck Hall, waiting for news from the field. But then he frowned and thought better of that idea. If he were at home, his mother would hound him with more letters. He’d telegrammed her about having to wait to leave until after the police interview. She was furious and had no patience with logic (the shipping lanes were closed) or probability (Wils felt safe as long as Arnold Archer was being watched). Wils had left for the dance without even reading his mother’s last two notes.

  Another waiter came by, and Wils took his fourth flute of champagne. It had become stuffy in the room and the liquid, so cool on his throat, felt even better when belted back quickly. He was tired and his shoulders ached. Terribly tired, in fact.

  His hand brushed a silk purse as he put down his glass. The purse tumbled to the floor and spilled open. As he reached to pick up the contents, he sniffed. The paper smelled of lilac. He stared slightly groggily at the page and then turned it over.

  Fall Comes in Shades of Red

  by Helen Windship Brooks

  Fall comes in shades of red

  And leaves in shrouds of white

  But crisp, silver snow

  can’t consecrate fields

  Burned while God slept at night.

  Night rests in shades of gray

  To hide the sun’s sacrist,

  And gravel grayed beasties

  from shadows emerge

  Turn dreams to dust, mem’ry to mist.

  Mist comes in all its despair

  And won’t lift until

  It chills fair maids who longed for love

  in rubble abed.

  Their voices silent, still.

  He put it down and sat back, a dark look on his face. He didn’t like it. Not one whit. Did this Miss Brooks think she was Emily Dickinson? He tugged at his starched collar. I mean, this mist chills us all, dear girl, not just fair maids who longed for love. What about all of those dead men?

  After a few moments he reread it. Perhaps it was the champagne talking, but the part about the chill and the rubble didn’t seem so bad on second glance. But the gray clearly represented Germany, his homeland. He shook his head and tossed the paper onto the table by the silk purse.

  What presumption. It must be some pinch-nosed, brown-draped, Boston spinster writing this patriotic nonsense. Give them something to be self-righteous about and off they’d go, putting their pens to paper and telling everyone how infallible Americans were.

  He wished the whole unpleasantness in Europe were over. Max’s death was already such a shock and the anger against Germany was palpable. He gave a
n involuntary shiver. Support the British and you’re a hero; support the Germans and you might as well hang.

  He looked through the crowd, tired and bleary-eyed. It wasn’t as if things were better in Germany. If he went home now, he, a poet, would probably have to be part of the army, helping the Germans fend off the Russians. He’d just read about the battle going on in the morning’s papers near Tannenberg, and it seemed the Germans were doing just fine without him. Such a mess.

  And so he put his head down on the table, wishing once again to be back in his room in Beck Hall. But even better, to close his eyes and be done with all of them.

  In what seemed to Wils to be an instant, he felt a tug on his shoulder. He opened his eyes. There was no music anymore, just the dull clink of dessert plates being stacked on trays by kitchen boys. He turned to see a young woman in white pulling at his arm.

  “The dance is over?” He blinked, his eyes blurred. It was the pretty girl who’d been dancing with Riley. What did she want?

  “Sir, do you know what happened to my purse?”

  He looked at the tiny purse, which had wicked the dripping condensation from four champagne glasses into its silk. It was a soggy mess. Her poem was also damp.

  “My purse, sir.”

  Trying to pull his thoughts together, he vaguely recalled a poem. Brooks, it was. “Are you Helen Brooks?” he asked. She didn’t look like a pinch-nosed spinster.

  “Yes.”

  “Are you related to Peter Brooks?”

  “He’s my brother,” she said, looking perplexed at the wet silk. “Did you see what happened?”

  Wils’s mouth felt like cotton. He needed some fresh air and wished she’d leave. “Oh, sorry about your purse. I put it over there to be out of the way. Won’t it dry?”

  “Silk spots.”

  “Oh. Terribly sorry.” He blinked again, reaching for her poem. “Couldn’t your mother have kept it for you while you danced?”

  Her eyebrows arched. “My mother is too busy to hold my purse.”

  “Oh,” he said, still groggy. “This fell out too,” he said, picking up her poem. “I’m Wilhelm von Lützow Brandl, a friend of your brother’s. I row on his crew team.”

  “You’re Wilhelm? I’ve heard of you. Your father is a famous poet, right?”

  “He was. Yes.”

  “You read my poem? Did you like it?” Her eyes softened.

  “When your purse fell open, it caught my eye. Sorry about the ink,” he said, handing it to her. “I must have placed it too close to one of these glasses. Do you have another copy?”

  “No.”

  “Well, it’s still fairly legible. I do like poetry and, even though our countries would disagree about the war, you made a decent start of it,” he said, trying to cheer her up.

  “But you thought this poem good?”

  Had he said it was good? He hoped not. “It has its moments,” was the best he could think to say. He winced as her ears reddened. “Really, Miss Brooks, it’s a good start. But death is a hard subject to do well. My professor says that death brings out the bad poet in us all. Perhaps you should have started with the moon over the water or some such.”

  “The bad poet in us all?” She squared her shoulders. “I am not a bad poet.”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  “What Germans say and what they do are quite different these days, I’ve found.”

  There was no hope of rational discussion with this young woman. He berated himself for even opening his mouth.

  “Good evening,” she said, abruptly turning on her heel, and heading toward an older, stocky man who was motioning to her that he was leaving.

  As she walked away, Wils felt a childish urge to flick some water on her matching silk skirt. How ridiculous this young lady was, insulting him and his country because of a comment on her poetry! How many times had he been told to use others’ poetry as a model—to reduce excess verbiage, or to consider a more subtle approach, and to avoid death in poetry completely? You didn’t see him become rude.

  He stood up and stalked outside. Good thing Harvard didn’t admit such cynical women. They were intolerable enough at a dance—their own territory.

  Wils picked up his pace along the gravel path to the gazebo, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He stood in the vast yard and looked up at the clear sky. The moon was large and bright, each star brilliant. It was hard to fathom that soldiers now abed in rubble halfway across the world saw the same sky.

  Wils walked slowly down the rest of the path to the river, where he found Peter Brooks alone in the gazebo, his tall, spare frame resting uncomfortably against one of the wrought iron supports. He stood in shirtsleeves, smoking an Egyptian cigarette. Its scent mixed with the fragrant blossoms of a white alder bush.

  Wils greeted him amusedly, “I met your sister, Peter. I don’t think she’s that fond of Germans.” The wooden swing creaked loudly as he sat down on it.

  “But the British are a different story apparently,” said Peter in a brisk tone. “Her friend Ann said she danced exclusively with Riley tonight.” He skipped a small rock in the river. “Wils, your cousin is irresponsible, a philanderer, and, as far as I can tell, completely incapable of being serious about anything except rowing.”

  “Come now, Peter. That’s unfair even by my standards. Riley was just dancing. No harm in that.”

  “I’m sure that’s what Lily thought. And Isobel and Grace too.”

  “I’ll give you Lily and Isobel, but Grace, and Rose, and, well, Edith and Lucia—” Wils broke off awkwardly. “Those weren’t entirely Riley’s doing.”

  “Is he still engaged to Edith?”

  “No,” Wils said quickly. He frowned. Was that right? “Actually, I’m not sure, come to think of it.”

  Peter looked at him intently. “Keep an eye on your cousin for me, Wils. Spencer needs to stay away from Helen.”

  “You’re not her father, Peter.”

  “And she’s not your sister,” Peter said drily. He flicked his cigarette into the water, picked up his jacket, and walked away along the gravel path.

  Wils shrugged as he heard the steps recede. Perhaps if he had a sister who danced with Riley he’d be angry too.

  He sat back in the swing and pushed his hands through his hair. A dull ache from the champagne he’d drunk had returned. And still all of his cares were with him. He’d irrigated his troubles, but not washed them away.

  The water lapped at the banks of the river, a soft swish and murmur. There was a distant splash—perhaps a mink or a muskrat—and the evening cry of a few migrating birds.

  It was so different here, he thought. So wild. The world beyond the gazebo, across the river, was untamed. It hadn’t been manicured into submission for four centuries like his lawn in Prussia.

  Perhaps this was what the earth looked like when it was new. Trees, and rocks, water, the leaves. Before Arnold Archer, before Riley Spencer, before Max, before war.

  Wils looked out into the depths of the wood.

  It was the America the German poet Goethe wrote about—reclaimed from the wilderness by honest toil. A community bound together by the demands of the frontier. Yoked to work but free of tyrants. Free of the burden of history. Without the blood of the past draining in every walled city’s gutter. The blood his own kaiser shed in Belgium. Napoleon before that. Cromwell. The Romanovs, Habsburgs, Tudors, Angevins, Guelphs, Ghibellines, Visigoths, Bosnians, Serbians, and countless others.

  He smiled, thinking of how much fun he’d had as an eight-year-old, when he’d run through the trees with his dog, Perg, under a ceiling of yellow leaves—a child playing with a simple, rich abandon through the shortening afternoon hours. Before the misery of adult life dawned on him. Before childhood friends and acquaintances like Max started disappearing into the night.

  He stopped the swing.
/>   Mein Gott, why did you let Max die?

  His heart sank as he looked into the sky. The stars were so clear. And so uncaring.

  Chapter Three

  Merrimack Hill

  Lexington, Massachusetts

  Sunday, August 30, 1914

  The maze of paths leading to Merrimack Hill from other fields was now abandoned and private, covered in years of pine straw and flanked by brambles, disappearing in the ever-thickening forest gathering around the Brooks family home. Piles of stone littered the property in odd lines, fossils of old stone fences now unrecognizable to the yeomen farmers who had once worked the land. The great fields of Lexington, once cleared for farming, now sprang with sugar maple and aspen, catalpa, ironwood, and oak. Buckthorn gathered around stone walls, its roots and branches toppling the rock in places, making it difficult to pass.

  The fields were much older than the house on Merrimack Hill, which had been built well after the last shot of the Revolution, and the last of the age of gentleman farming in the 1800s. Helen’s grandfather had built it to be in the middle of nature and a good distance from his neighbors, who, at that time, had been overcome by the craze of Thoreau’s famous experiment in simple living at Walden Pond.

  Helen’s grandfather was one of the few who resisted a simple life, maintaining that if one really wanted to understand life, plenty of people had written books on the subject and those books could be read by one’s well-tended and elaborately carved hearth. As the family’s shipping interests provided more income than they could ever spend, Jonathan Brooks Sr. built a large house in which to raise his only child, Jonathan Edwards Brooks Jr., outside of the clutches of Beacon Hill in Boston. For added security, should Boston society wish to invade his privacy in Lexington, he purchased two additional estates, in Maine and New Hampshire, to which they could escape.

  By the dawn of the twentieth century, the Brooks estate sat on five acres at the southern edge of the Merrimack River Valley. The house had been built a half mile from the same road on which the Colonial militia escorted the British back to Boston and, as was the wont of Brooks men, it was traditional: a redbrick Federal with two floors and a basement, two central chimneys, and white-painted windows outlined by black shutters. Gas lanterns lit the bright red front door, and by the wide slate steps at the front visitors found an iron boot wipe bolted into a moss-covered stone.