A/N: Speeding through these updates at the mo so I'll try and keep up the pace! As always, your thoughts mean the world so thank you!
CHAPTER SIX: THE CONFRONTATION
"I tried to tell you..." the impresario murmured gravely - but Georg wasn't listening. Instead he watched in silent horror as colonel Landa appeared out of the throng, moving to Maria's side and snaking a hand around her waist, whispering something intimately into the shell of her ear. Georg's shock was instant, his sudden turmoil crushing - and his heart turned over in his chest at the guilty look that his wife cast at him. It was a look peppered with shame, with pity, with discomfort - a look that turned him to ashes.
"No.." he heard himself choke in disbelief - though it felt as though he'd shouted the word, so stricken was the resulting gaze they shared. It lasted for only a second however, before she seemed to remember herself, tearing her eyes away from him... turning into the waiting arms of the colonel.
Despair quickly morphed into rage.
"That Nazi bastard!" he snarled, his feet moving before his brain had a chance to catch up - acting purely on the urgent desire to ram the colonel's head into the nearest wall.
"Georg, don't!" Max hissed, anchoring an arm of steel across his chest to hold him back, "you can't make a scene! Not here.."
Red with fury but unable to dispute such a statement, Georg wrenched out of his friend's grip and straightened his jacket, running a hand through his hair, "how could she?" He spat venomously, fists clenching into rocks at his sides, "how could she! Doesn't she know who he is?!"
As if it wasn't enough that she'd decided to end their marriage - now she was spending her spare time frolicking around with another man only four weeks after his departure? Not only another man, but a Nazi colonel? It defied all reasonable logic, it stretched beyond the realms of possibility, it contradicted everything he'd ever known and loved about this woman. But then again, he thought grimly - perhaps he'd never really known her at all.
"Apparently they've been spending quite a bit of time together," the impresario revealed solemnly, "I would've told you sooner, but I swear Georg, I had no idea..."
His stomach twisting in revulsion and undeniable jealousy, Georg watched helplessly as Landa took Maria's gloved hand in his and swept her onto the dance floor. Even in his lowest moments - in the middle of the night when he would wake in a sweat shouting her name - never could he have envisaged that this would be their reality. The colonel was the type of man that surely would've repulsed the Maria he knew! None of it made any common sense.
Unable to comprehend what he was seeing, he simply shook his head in sheer incredulity, "this is madness," he growled, turning to the impresario, "utter madness! I have to talk to her..."
"I'm not sure that'd be wise..." Max warned, adding hopefully, "why don't we just get tiddled and put it on Landa's room tab instead? Maybe key his car?"
But his suggestions went entirely unheeded. The second the orchestra's ballad drew to a close, Georg traced his wife's every move with the predatory eye of a hawk - until he saw her slip behind a rippling curtain at the far end of the room, out onto the open terrace beyond. Seeing his opportunity, he immediately broke into a march across the dance floor, completely ignoring the impresario's desperate attempts to restrain him. Pushing impatiently through the throng like a man posessed, he gave very little regard for the dozens of guests he happened to barge out of the way in his pursuit. A countess here, a baron there, a waiter or two who had to scramble to keep their tray of hors d'oeuvres balanced on gloved palms as Captain Von Trapp of the Austro-Hungarian Imperial Navy parted the crowd like the Red Sea.
Reaching the curtain and tearing it to one side, he found her alone with her back to him, leaning against the balustrade and gazing pensively into the darkness of the grounds beyond. Unaware of his sudden presence, she didn't turn around - and so he stood there for a moment, allowing himself the small transgression of simply looking at her. His wife. His partner. His everything - even after the tumultuous events of the past few weeks. It was simply impossible to hate her.
Filling his lungs with air, he drank in the sight of her, long legs draped in silk, the slender curve of her back, the golden curls at the nape of her neck - and his heart ached with longing. It was a fierce kind of need that gripped him, the type that would normally have him clamping his lips to the delicate patch of skin where throat met shoulder, twining his arms around her front and moulding the length of his body to hers. His fingers twitched with the desire to touch her, to pull her into his arms and beg her to put an end to his suffering. To kiss her, to hold her and yes, even to ravish her - in a way that only a husband could his wife. Despite everything that had come to pass, he couldn't deny that he still pined for her like he needed oxygen to breathe - and if only for a moment, the longing assuaged the anger.
A breeze swept the terrace then and with it, he felt his resolve dissipate into the night. She gave a light shiver against the chill of the air and instinctively he shed his jacket, moving as close as he dared before wrapping it around her bare shoulders, being careful not to touch her. She hugged the garment around herself, smiling out onto the gardens.
"Thank you Han-"
"Do not speak his name to me," Georg strangled, his low whisper cutting through the air like a sharpened blade. Alarmed by the familiar baritone, she spun around on the spot, her face white as a sheet.
"Georg!"
"When were you going to tell me?" He asked quietly, bile rising in his throat, ignoring the tremble that he noticed in her lower lip. Gathering her bravery, she lifted her chin in challenge - though he saw right through the feeble facade.
"I didn't think it was any of your business!" She bristled haughtily.
"Our divorce papers haven't even been finalised yet!" He snapped, barely recognising her for the coldness in her eyes.
"And whose fault is that?!" She bit back sharply - both of them knowing all too well that the papers she'd sent him were laying forgotten somewhere amidst the mess of his hotel suite. He'd meant to sign them, really he had - but every time he'd picked up a pen his hand had trembled too vigorously to be of any use, and he'd ended up throwing the stationary across the room instead.
Ignoring her rebuttal, he took a furious step closer, the atmosphere pulsing with the restrained anger that he thought had disappeared with the wind.
"And where are the children while their mother spends her nights gallivanting around town like a common-"
"I have not been gallivanting around!" She hissed, casting a furtive glance over his shoulder into the ballroom behind him to ensure they weren't being overheard. He was far past the point of caring however.
"What do you call it then?" He spat desperately, "making new friends?"
She said nothing, avoiding his interrogative gaze, eyes shifting to the floor in an attempt to dodge his scrutiny. There was something in her nervous expression that shifted, something that made him take pause.
"Has he forced himself upon you?" He growled, taking another step closer, fury prickling his skin, "because if he has, I swear I'll snap his-"
"Oh I should've guessed!" she scoffed sardonically, her previous defiance back in full force, "it would be simply incomprehensible to you that I might actually welcome another man's affections!"
Shock and dismay seeped into his veins like molten lava spilling down a rocky terrain. Another man's affections? She wasn't even trying to deny it! With his worst fears confirmed, his stomach roiled and his head spun with grief, outrage, envy...
"Can you blame me for refusing to accept this display of absolute insanity?!" he raged, beginning to prowl the length of the balcony like a caged panther.
She gaped at him in disbelief, "You arrogant... " she trailed, "He has forced me into nothing! We met at the Becker's dinner party earlier this month-"
"Are you aware of who he is?" Georg hissed, rounding on her with his full height, as though it might actually intimidate her, "Of what he does?!"
"Of course I am!"
"Then how can you live with yourself?!" He demanded, loud enough for the whole of Salzburg to hear.
"Keep your voice down!"
His lips curled into a bitter sneer.
"Are you afraid I might embarrass you?"
"It's far too late for that!" Came her biting retort, "As for what he does, we don't discuss his work. Precisely because it doesn't define him," she shot him a scathing look, "Some men are more than their uniforms, Captain!"
With that, she turned her back on him and looked out over the gardens again, as if that marked the end of the conversation. He thought otherwise.
"Some men want to watch the world burn!" he snarled at the back of her head - and it must've struck the desired nerve, for she rounded on him faster than she had done by the lakeside all those years ago.
"What makes you any better?!" she challenged with eyes burning, prodding a sharp finger into his chest, "If the shoe was on the other foot, and God forbid, you found yourself in their uniform when war broke you, would you consider yourself inherently evil?!"
"I would never fight alongside them!" He argued fiercely.
"In that case you'd choose to fight against them!" She countered, "Some of them would be your own countrymen, some not much older than Friedrich!" Would you consider yourself evil then?"
He said nothing, his throat working furiously, face twisted with bitter anger.
"You killed hundreds of people for the sake of your beloved empire," she continued passionately, "What makes you morally superior? He is made of flesh and blood, just as you are! But one fact does differentiate you," she revealed venomously, "his job is exactly that - a job. Which is more than I could ever say for you!"
She sent him stumbling backwards with a final shove to his chest and he simply stared at her, dumbfounded.
"Who are you?" he rasped, "you've been brainwashed. Utterly brainwashed."
"No," was her fierce retort, "I'm seeing things perfectly clearly! You pass judgement, even when you understand nothing of a person's convictions, his beliefs, his views... " she shook her head in disappointment, "you see only the uniform."
Shaken to the core, his hands trembled with unrelenting rage.
"I dare say you've seen a damn sight more than only the uniform," he boomed, "More specifically, what's underneath it!"
Taking him completely by surprise, she bared her teeth in a lioness's growl and raised a hand above her head as if to slap him. On impulse, he straightened, ready to welcome the sobering sting of the deserved blow - but she was interrupted by the untimely arrival of the last man in the world that Georg wished to see.
"Maria darling, is everything alright?" Landa enquired curiously, stepping out onto the terrace and taking his place protectively by her side. She nodded quickly with eyes downcast, offering no words to the contrary. Apparently satisfied with her answer, the colonel turned to Georg instead, his face breaking into a devilish grin.
"I boasted of being a detective before captain, but I confess that it is you who has caught me red-handed!" he chuckled wickedly, "most of my learnings about you were sourced from Maria here," he tightened his arm securely around her waist.
"Is that so," Georg gritted, desperately attempting to stand firm in favour of his pride.
"It's nothing personal, I can assure you," the colonel reiterated graciously, casting a triumphant glance at the woman by his side, "Just think of it as the better man having won. You sound like an individual of impeccable standing however - and I'm normally an excellent judge of character," he added proudly, "I'm sure the Fuhrer would be very interested to make your acquaintance, in fact."
Offering a strained smile, Georg simply shook his head, "I fear I wouldn't quite meet the Fuhrer's expectations.."
Smirking knowingly, the colonel appraised him for long seconds, the silence stretching on, unbearable in its intensity, until-
"You know captain," he began, with the playful lilt of an animated storyteller, "if one were to determine what attribute the German people share with a beast, it would be the cunning and the predatory instinct of a hawk. It is also the case with the likes of men of rank, such as you and I - though we have not a drop of German blood running through our veins," he waved the point away impatiently as though it was of little consequence.
"Now," he continued, "if one were to determine what attributes the Austrian population shares with a beast - you and I aside, of course - it would be that of a sheep. Easily persuaded by flock mentality, led mindlessly adrift by promises of protection and reward, and in desperate need of a shepherd to guide them," he listed these facts with casual flippancy, before his entire face suddenly darkened with shadow, his tone shifting dangerously, "I am a shepherd, Captain - just as you are. Whether we like it or not, we were born shepherds, where they-" he gave a jut of his strong chin towards the ballroom, "-were born sheep. Men like us must guide the weak, even against their own better judgement."
Georg held his piercing stare, refusing to let such disturbing words affect him, "I have faith they'll choose the right path," he stated meaningfully.
Landa's eyes flashed with gleeful triumph once again, "as do I..."
With a curt nod, Georg made to leave.
"Captain?"
He halted in his tracks.
"Colonel?"
"Next week, I'm having a little get together with some of the gentlemen in attendance here tonight," Landa purred charmingly, all darkness having vanished from his face, "I'd be honoured if you'd join us. It would be an opportunity for you to meet some of my acquaintances here in Salzburg, and for the both of us to set aside our differences. Or should I say... similarities?!" he guffawed, pulling Maria emphatically closer to his side, "After all, we may be sharing a new flag soon enough!"
His wife, his flag - was there anything else this man wanted to snatch from him, Georg wondered. Forcing a courteous smile that he imagined must've looked more like a grimace, he inclined his head in acknowledgment of the offer.
"I'll be sure to clear my busy schedule."
Again he turned to leave, resisting the urge to break into a run, when-
"Geor... uh, Captain?" Maria bleated after him. Gritting his teeth, he turned rigidly to find her holding out his forgotten jacket, her shoulders bare once again. Reaching impatiently for the garment, he was rendered momentarily paralysed when he caught Landa running a single finger down the length of her arm. She shivered at his touch, clearly affected - and Georg was hit by a violent wave of distress. Snatching the coat from her outstretched fingers, he turned on his heel and fled the terrace, before he relinquished the last of his control and throttled the host to within an inch of his life.
The next morning, he signed and filed the divorce papers.
A/N: Some of you have made some interesting predictions. I guess we'll have to wait and see! Again, some of Landa's quotes have been modified from the script of Quentin Tarantino's Inglorious Basterds - I own nothing, all for fun etc etc