Atomic-scale helices exist as motifs for several material lattices. We examine a tight-binding model for a single one-dimensional monatomic chain with a p-orbital basis coiled into a helix. A topologically nontrivial phase emerging from this model supports a chiral symmetry-protected zero-energy mode localized to a boundary, always embedded within a continuum band, regardless of termination site. We identify a topological invariant for this phase that is related to the number of zero energy end modes by means of the bulk-boundary correspondence, and give strict conditions for the existence of the bound state. An additional class of gapped edge modes in the model spectrum has practical consequences for surface states in, e.g., trigonal tellurium and selenium and other van der Waals-bonded one-dimensional semiconductors.