The Sound of Music has been one of my favorite movies for as long as I can remember. As kids, my sister and I memorized every word and used to act it out (with the two of us playing all seven von Trapp kids – and every other role!). So, this story has been some time in coming. It will feature some "missing scenes" from the family's escape, and the focus will shift between a few different characters.
L'chi lach, to a land that I will show you
Leich l'cha, to a place you do not know
L'chi lach, on your journey, I will bless you
And you will be a blessing, l'chi lach
– Debbie Friedman, L'chi Lach (based on Genesis 12)
"We've got to get out of Austria..." Georg's voice was sad but quietly determined, "...and this house. Tonight." He allowed himself only a moment to gaze around, one last time, at the font hall of the mansion where he'd lived for so long – where his children were born, where his wife died. He could practically see the ghosts of memories and old times fluttering down the hallway, past the artwork and all the other fine things that he must leave behind.
Georg couldn't have care less for the possessions and wealth that he would lose by fleeing his homeland overnight, but it did seem cruel that just now, just after Maria had made this grand house into a home again, filling with happiness and music once more, now they were all being forced to leave it, probably forever. He'd told Elsa once that he left his home so often because he was searching for a reason to stay. Well, now he had finally found a reason – or rather, he'd realized that seven reasons had been there all along, but now the Nazis were giving him a reason to leave again.
He took one last look around, and then he turned away, knowing in his heart that this house – indeed, this entire part of his life – already belonged to the past.
::
Upstairs, he found a travel satchel in the bottom bureau drawer and hastily began shoving some of his most expensive things inside – his silver square cufflinks, his gold-plated pocket watch and matching chain, his black, long-stemmed cigar holder, trimmed in real elephant ivory. He knew that he might need them to bribe officials in Vienna and at the border. For good measure, he added some small wads of money, too. He threw all these inside without a second glance, but he hesitated when he came to his war medals.
Maria hurried into their bedroom just then from the east wing, where she'd been helping the children get ready to leave. "Georg, is there enough gasoline in the motor-car," she started to ask him, "or should we..."
But the question died on her lips when she saw Georg's ashen face as he picked up his war medals. Maria had seen them only twice before – once at the party that he threw for Baronness Schraeder, and once at their wedding. Georg had polished them and worn them so proudly then. It felt jarring to see them now, in such a grim situation, but there again was the golden Military Merit Medal for Bravery, engraved with Emperor Charles's profile and the Latin words forhonor and praise, and the silver Knight's Cross of the Order of Maria Theresa, with its thick ribbon in the pattern of the Austrian flag. Maria knew that this one was the most prestigious war medal in all Austria and had been presented to Georg by Emporer Charles himself.
Georg's hands trembled as he ran his fingers over the engravings in the cool metal, and that jarred Maria even more. Her husband was such a strong, confident man, as firm as a stone in his beliefs of right and wrong, which was why he refused to work with the Nazis. But his expression now was so uncertain, so vulnerable...
Maria flashed back to that awful night during their honeymoon – the night of the Anschluss. They had huddled around the radio set in their luxury hotel room, listening to the BBC radio broadcast. It was a perfectly calm, pleasant night in Paris, with a warm breeze fluttering the curtains of their balcony overlooking the Champs-Élysées, but Maria felt ice-cold as she listened to the news and saw Georg's reaction to it. The color had drained from his face when the reporter announced that Chancellor Schuschnigg had been forced to resign, and tears had actually filled his eyes when they heard the crowds cheering as Nazi troops marched into Vienna.
With a heavy sigh, Georg set his medals down on top of the bureau. "I'll leave them," he said, his voice soft but strong, and his hands steady again. "I can't bring them. It would be too dangerous."
Maria knew that he was right, that it would be dangerous for their family if Georg brought his medals. The Nazis were already pretending that Austria was Germany now and always had been. It would be bad enough, if they were all caught trying to escape, but if Georg were found with Austrian war medals on him...
Yet Maria also knew that her husband felt torn apart by the thought of leaving those medals behind. She knew that to Georg, they symbolized much more than victory and heroics. They stood for Austria itself, a country that Georg had been willing to die for.
She stepped over to him and put one hand on his arm. He looked up at her, his blue eyes more distraught than she'd ever seen them, but she said as cheerfully as she could manage, "Perhaps you don't have to leave them behind. You forget that I can sew my own clothes. Where's my needle and thread?"
She found them in the top bureau drawer, and her quick fingers threaded the needle in the blink of an eye. Georg took off his coat and wrapped his medals up in a handkerchief, folding them carefully, so they wouldn't clink against each other and make noise. In no time at all, Maria had sewn them into the lining of his coat. The seams were perfect, all but invisible, and there was no bulge in his coat to make any officials suspicious. Even when Georg shook it out, the medals made no noise.
"Maria," he said, fumbling for words, slightly stunned. She almost laughed at the surprised expression on his face, which was so remniscent of the look that he gave her months ago, when she brazenly told him that she wasn't about to answer to a whistle. "I can't tell you what this means..."
She just smiled and answered softly, "You don't have to. I know."
::
A few minutes later, they turned on the radio, hoping for news that might help them know which route to take out of Austria, but instead, Adolf Hitler was giving a speech. "We come here not as tyrants," he announced to some cheering crowd, "but as liberators. I — "
But that was as far as the Fuhrer got before Georg picked up the radio from the table and smashed it on the floor. It was a terrible display of temper, but Maria just smiled, because his hands weren't trembling anymore. Somehow, Maria felt certain that wherever they went, and whatever happened to them on the way, they would be all right, as long as they were all together, and as long as Georg's hands were so strong and certain.
