His father’s only remark as he prepared to go was “A black tie? Has there been the death of a stage actor?”

His two older brothers, already resentful of the fuss and their mother’s agitation, declined to come down to see him off.

He rode the train east in a first-class compartment. His father had absolutely ruled out such an indulgence, and his mother had slipped him the extra money to change the fare. For most of the trip he rode under the insolent scrutiny of two immaculately dressed young men across the aisle. One featured a silk collar with an iridescent rose-and-copper tie, and spar-rock cuff links. Wilhelm was wearing his only suit. On either side of him were trunks too large for the baggage racks: the farmboy, in from the country with all his worldly possessions.

He managed his first hellos as a man of the world. The two young men responded with the thin smiles they might offer the mother of a harelipped infant. Wilhelm gave their expressions the benefit of the doubt and spent the rest of the trip empty-headed with self-conscious excitement. From time to time he peered through his windowpane at the sodden countryside, and through that wet glass he first viewed Berlin’s landscape of moraines.

His grand entrance to Charlottenburg involved having to wrestle his trunks off the passenger step of the lounge car. The immaculate fellow passengers had long since left. One trunk became wedged. He heard titters behind him. He sweated and pulled. His embarrassment increased. He felt he should have been wearing a straw hat and carrying chickens in a cage.

Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele was across the platform, watching from a bench. He looked comfortably situated. His compact valise sat parallel to his feet.

For Wilhelm it was as if he’d caught his first glimpse of life’s splendor, which in its fullness had always surrounded him, veiled from view and far off. He stared while extricating his trunks. The boy at whom he stared was finely freckled. He had a pleasant squint. He had shell-blue eyes, and the tolerant expression of someone watching a small animal attempt something inexplicable.

Behind Wilhelm an elderly woman finally asked if he needed assistance. Wilhelm forgot to speak, for looking at the boy on the bench.

Later he asked his new friend why he hadn’t helped.

Hans said he thought it was something he should manage by himself—first day and all that. He then asked why, if he had seemed so rude, Wilhelm had come over and introduced himself.

All this had transpired while they shared a hansom to school. Wilhelm, emboldened by his first day of adventure, had confided that he’d thought to himself, If you don’t talk to him now, you’ll only waste weeks trying to find him again. And so he had stacked his two trunks and lumbered over, teetering under the weight.