Intermezzo I - Ignorance is bliss
Part Four
A/N: Georg broods, and Max enters the picture. Elsa starts to have some ideas if her own. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: See chapter 1.
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There is no aphrodisiac like innocence.
Jean Baudrillard
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To conquer the enemy without resorting to war is the most desirable. The highest form of generalship is to conquer the enemy by strategy.
Sun Tzu
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"She is not meant to be a nun. She is not going to be a nun… It cannot be the life she was born to live!"
Captain von Trapp took a large gulp of his brandy.
"Definitely not the best vintage," he grimaced, feeling the amber liquid burn down his throat. Well, if that would result in a hangover, he would certainly deserve it. He had indeed been drinking a little too much lately – ever since a certain governess entered his world, as a matter of fact. If his wife were alive, undoubtedly she would scold him and hide the keys to the cellar somewhere. Where the hell did she hide his cigars the last time she caught him smoking them, only weeks before her death?
But if his wife were still alive, would he be brooding about young postulants from Benedictine Abbeys?
"Certainly not," he thought with a grimace.
He wondered if the postulant in question had any idea of the fact that she had been blushing all the time during their debate in the nursery. He wondered if her face would have ever return to her normal color again. She had tried so hard to act as if they were discussing an ordinary, everyday subject, as if she was not feeling her face burn, but she had been absolutely dismal at it. She rambled about her advanced, liberal, progressive education, and yet the five (at least) different shades of red in her cheeks and her fidgeting hands betrayed her completely. It made him wonder if that school of hers was progressive in name only – probably yes.
Of course he had no intention of leading the conversation to such a subject. He did not recall discussing the delicate topic of the children's sexual education with anyone else but their mother before, least of all a governess, and one who hardly knew anything about life other than what she had witnessed inside those convent walls and so-called progressive schools. It had been her, the way she reacted that made it impossible for him to resist the temptation of leading her to that final logical trap. He felt his need to push her, to make her to react to him, to make her descend for that ethereal cloud she seemed to live in. To show her that, in the world, there was much more than the mountains of the Salzkammergut for her to explore, and that maybe, just maybe, she should experience a little more of that before she made the final decision to lock herself for life.
When she finally caught his bait, he had laughed.
Yes, her outraged "I grew up in a farm!" cry had been hilarious enough, but it had not been the only reason for his appalling, nearly hysterical reaction. It had been a reaction to uncover another one, one that he was now trying to drown in brandy. What he had wanted to do was to take the virginal governess in his arms, drag her to his bedroom and teach her everything about how babies were made, things that he was sure that they never taught her any progressive school she might have attended, or in the farms she had grown up in.
That was it, the shocking truth he was now trying to digest. He, the worldly, cosmopolitan, sophisticated, experienced Captain Georg von Trapp, found himself irrevocably aroused by his children's governess.
"Physical attraction, that is all there is to it. It is just skin deep. Nothing but a normal, completely understandable reaction for a man who has been without a woman in his bed for too long."
If so, he had to ask himself why wasn´t he reacting like that when the woman he wanted to marry was around? Why not Elsa, who was, like him, equally worldly, sophisticated and experienced, who made no secret that she would eagerly welcome him in her bed if he only asked? Why did he find so easy not to sleep with Elsa simply because he planned to marry her, and by doing so he would risk damaging her reputation? No, Elsa, with all her flawless beauty had never affected him quite the same way. Yes, he did find her physically attractive, that was not to be denied, however, the attraction was of a different kind.
Maria… Fräulein Maria, on the other hand…
He felt a chill down his spine at the thought. No, not that, never that. Never again. The thought was too ludicrous to be even considered.
"You are playing with fire, Georg. Stop before it is too late."
He looked up from his desk to see Max, standing by the door. The sight of his friend was almost a relief, since it had rescued him from the very disturbing direction his musings were taking him. Funnily enough, the warning words spoken by Max had exactly echoed his thoughts.
"I have no idea of what you are talking about," he said haughtily, but his best friend was not so easily fooled.
"Oh yes, you do!"
"Elsa knows the rules of the game as well as I do, Max," he said, trying to lead the conversation to another direction that was likely to entertain the impresario as well.
"I am not talking about Elsa," Max said, walking to the decanter, to help himself to some brandy.
"I am," he said, in the same haughty voice.
"All right, Captain. If you say you are than you are," Max toasted to him, with a mischievous look in his face.
Georg ignored his mockery. "She knows what is at stake for me, she knows that I have the children to consider. The children, and… other things. She will be just fine."
"I am sure she will, but I have known her for as long as you have, probably longer. She is not the most patient woman in the world and…" Max chuckled.
"And what?"
"Well, I hate to hurt your male pride, but you are not the only one interested!"
"I know that!" he retorted, with some exasperation. "If I loose, then I loose. I have lost before and I dealt with it just fine."
"The war, Georg! You have lost the war, you have never lost a woman to another man!" Max set his glass down. "This is not like you at all. Those are not the words of a jealous lover."
"I am not the jealous type."
Max laughed. "If Agathe were around, she would…"
"Please, do keep my wife out of this. And I hate to disappoint your dirty mind, but Elsa and I are not lovers," he said pointedly.
"Yet," Max provoked.
"Max! I was under the impression that you were here to be our chaperon."
"Well, I was under the impression that you asked me to be the chaperon because you know how terrible I would be at that." Georg shook his head. "But I beg to differ about you dealing well with loss. Come on, Georg! Just look around you, just look at yourself."
"Beg all you want, Max. I will not loose this time. I know what I am doing. I will not be so easily distracted by…"
"Ah hah!" Max exclaimed triumphantly. "So there is a distraction!"
Georg glared. "I refuse to dignify that with any further comments."
"Oh, I don't blame you. She is young, innocent, alluring, captivating, and she does have a way of getting under you skin even without trying too hard. Don't give me that look, as if you don't know who I am talking about. I sensed something in the air about this little Fräulein of yours while you were still in Vienna."
"My governess is…"
"… never going to be a nun if she stays in this house long enough. God, I need another drink," said Max, helping himself to some more brandy. "Tell me, do you think Nonnberg would mind a nun with a past, or a not so virginal postulant?" he toasted, mockingly.
"You know me too well. I would not touch her, I would not…" Max gave him a look of disbelief. "She is going to be a nun, dammit! What kind of man do you think I am? I would never…"
"So you have thought about it."
"She is not meant to be a nun!" he exclaimed, distastefully. "I mean she is meant to be a nun."
Max laughed at his obvious slip of tongue.
"All right, all right, gloat all you want," Georg said, "I think I had too much to drink tonight. This bad brandy is just beginning to affect my sanity. Why don't we go and see what Elsa is up to."
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"So?" she asked Max, expectantly, when he entered the drawing room.
"So what?"
"Where is he?" Elsa crushed her cigarette in her ashtray, nervous.
"The Captain has retired, of course, after having drunk too much of that suspicious bottle of brandy Herr Schneider sent him for Christmas last year. Terrible stuff, if you ask me!"
Elsa was very impatient – that was not exactly what she had been dying to know. "What did you find out? Were my suspicions correct?"
His answer was to quote their earlier conversation. "What about that "I'm terribly fond of Georg and I will not have you toying with us"talk"?
"Max, how can you be so mean to me," she pouted. Of course she knew that one of the few things Max took very seriously and valued in his life was his friendship and loyalty towards Georg. He would not betray whatever the Captain had told him in confidence. "Max!" she insisted, hating herself to have to resort to what she thought was the lowest female weapon – whining.
"All right, all right. But I will not say a word – I'll let you guess instead. You draw your conclusions and I'll just say yes or no."
"Fair enough."
"You are in deep trouble, my darling, and that is all you'll hear from me."
"Oh Max! Is he really…"
"I said I would say no more."
"Infatuated?"
Max nodded. "Infatuated, besotted, bewitched, enchanted, charmed… you may add all the synonyms you want. As usual, you hit the target with scorching precision, Baroness Machiavelli! You were right – those madly peeling bells were not necessarily for you."
"That little nun turned out to be quite a sorceress! I can certainly understand why the children are so fascinated by her, but him!"
"The little Fräulein is completely oblivious, you should know that."
"Of course she is, and that is only making her more attractive to him! Even I have to admit none of this is not her fault. Otherwise she would not be parading in front of him in that clinging wet dress for hours," she exaggerated. "What shall I do?" She began pacing around the room, nervously. She lit another cigarette. "Oh, Max, what shall I do?"
"Elsa, you will know what to do, I'm sure. I cannot get involved. I owe Georg too much, and I do not mean money."
"You owe me too!"
"Yes, that is why I am just going to sit back and observe. You won't need advice, you're just too clever."
"The last time I saw him like this was when…" she stopped cold. "No, I don't even want to think about that. Loosing him to my best friend was one thing. Loosing him to a convent girl would be a terrible blow to my reputation… not to mention my pride. Imagine that!"
"You won't loose, Elsa. I think he is merely attracted by the novelty. Young, fresh, wholesome, innocent… Don't the French say that innocence is a great aphrodisiac?"
"I have no idea what the French say, Max, but if that is all there is to it, then I hope you are right."
"Of course I am right, I always am! What are you going to do about it, my dear?"
Elsa shrugged. "Well, nothing, of course."
"Nothing?" Max frowned at her. "I don't understand!"
"Nothing. Darling, if he is merely besotted with her, as we are quite certain he is, it is not worth the trouble to do anything. The children adore the little nun, and if they even imagine I might be the cause of her going away, they will never forgive me. Ergo, he would never forgive me. You know well as I do that he will not make me the next Baroness von Trapp if his children do not fully approve of me."
"Machiavelli would be proud!" Max applauded.
"Ah, but there is more. If there is all there is to it, once he has his little fling, he will forget her soon enough. Even the children won't be able to keep him from sending her away, and he will have to, because naturally he would not be able to keep her as a governess after he slept with her." Max watched her in fascination, as her ideas developed. "On the other hand, if he does not have his way with her, he will tire of the idea eventually. You are right, she is young, fresh, wholesome – new. She helped him with his children, she taught them to sing. Soon enough, this will all be old news. She will return to that convent of hers, and I would be here, his lovely little Elsa with arms open to receive him."
"Correction – I think you just have surpassed poor old Machiavelli."
"I am not proud of myself, Max. You know, I never had the need to be this manipulative before. But if that is what it takes, I am willing to run the risk. I will not be the wicked fiancée trying to keep the dark and tortured but terribly handsome widowed hero away from the poor innocent and clueless governess. It is terribly cliché, isn't it? I was never fond of those hideous gothic novels! No, even if I were caught up in a story like that, I would want to be the heroine, not the evil witch."
"Enlighten me, then. What is this nothing you are going to do?"
She gave him a mischievous smile.
"Max, you know me so well that sometimes it is almost frightening!"
"Do tell me!"
"I was thinking about that poor girl…"
"So you are worried about the little Fräulein!"
"Naturally I am worried. The poor thing, it is not her fault at all. What kind of woman do you think I am?" There was a calculated expression of feigned innocence in her face as she said that. "Imagine if she finds out that the wicked Baron wants to bed her! How fast do you think she would run back to the protective walls of Nonnberg?"
"You would not!"
"Of course I would not. As I said, I will not be the wicked evil witch in this story. The children adore her, and Georg needs her to keep the children happy – which means I need her too, at least for the moment. No, I won't do or say a thing, unless it becomes absolutely necessary, of course. Now, let us forget about this nonsense. I have worried about this long enough."