A/N: Thanks again for all the lovely reviews, and for sticking with me through such long chapters! In this chapter, I struggled a bit with the titles "Mother Abbess" versus "Reverend Mother," but I settled on using the second as a form of address and the first as a description of her role.
And do you think I've gone too far by letting Maria even consider what it would be like to give into him? Please review – even if only a word or two – the Gazebo chapter is turning out to be a lot of work and I could use the encouragement. Once again, I don't own the Sound of Music or anything about it.
Chapter 4 Maria's Afternoon
Maria stepped aside to let a new postulant leave before entering the Mother Abbess' office. The girl was on her way to the robing room, undoubtedly. Could it have been only a few months since I was a girl like that, putting on someone else's discarded clothes? Since I left here, singing at the top of my lungs, full of hopeful excitement about my little adventure? I feel a hundred years older, much sadder, and no wiser.
She promised herself that she would divulge as little as possible to Reverend Mother about her time at the villa: not about the Captain, the Baroness, even the children. She couldn't bear to talk about any of them, as though talking about them aloud would make their loss unavoidably real. I loved those children, and they loved me. I loved living at the villa. I let myself love their father, and even worse, I let myself believe that he loved me. She would simply say that she missed the Abbey and was anxious to take her vows as soon as possible. Certainly a long-cloistered nun, even the Mother Abbess herself, would not be able to guess at Maria's predicament, would not be able to see through her.
Alas, the Mother Abbess' kind greeting, and a gentle question or two, were all it took. Even after everything that had happened, Maria could still not lie to anyone. She heard herself admitting truth after truth, the tears rising to the surface, her voice thickening with emotion , "…I was confused. I – I've never felt that way before. I knew that I'd be safe here…" and then, finally: "I can't face him again."
"Are you in love with him?"
"I don't know. I don't know!" Maria burst out, in agony, tears of anguish beginning to fall. "The Baroness said I was. She said…" Maria hesitated. Whatever she was feeling, she could not possibly tell Reverend Mother the sordid truth, what she had learned from the Baroness about the Captain's true interest in her. And how could she admit that, even now, she was still as tempted by the Captain as she was repelled by the situation? She would surely be sent away from the Abbey, and she had nowhere else to go.
Choosing her words carefully, Maria quickly edited her sad story: "She said he was in love with me," she told Reverend Mother, taking a small, pitiful moment's pleasure in saying the words out loud. " Oh, there were times when we would look at each other…. Oh Mother, I could hardly breathe!" It was a relief, after all, to talk about her feelings for the Captain out loud, to unburden herself. "That's what's been torturing me. I was there on God's errand. To have asked for his love would have been wrong. I'm ready at this moment to take my vows."
Maria turned away, toward the fireplace, so that Reverend Mother could not see the complete truth, the rest of it, in her eyes. For Maria was not telling the whole story. She did feel guilty for betraying her duty to God, but how could she possibly tell the rest of it, that she had, if innocently, played a part in such a sordid situation? And how could she admit that, even knowing what she knew now, there was a part of her that could not let him go?
Maria felt like she was drowning in the emotions that flooded through her. She pleaded, "Please, Mother, let me stay, I beg of you." Through her tears, she heard the Mother Abbess tell her that she could not hide from her feelings in the Abbey, that she had to go back and find out the truth.
Reverend Mother is talking about the love between a man and a woman. But Captain von Trapp never loved me, and he never will. I was foolish to believe otherwise. Yet, still, I cannot stop thinking about him. If I tell her the truth about him – can it really be true? - she will not make me go back to the villa, but she probably will not let me take my vows either, and then I will have nowhere to go. And the truth is that I cannot stay away any longer, I cannot resist the opportunity to see the children and to see him one more time. I should not have run away without looking into his eyes one more time, without seeing for myself the truth about him. I have to know. "Very well, Mother." She bowed her head in submission – but also to hide her face from Reverend Mother's searching glance. It turned out that she was capable of lying after all.
There was only one more question to ask: "But Mother, what happens if…"
"If it is not happily after ever, as they say in the fairy tales? If he cannot give you your heart's desire? Then at least you will know, Maria. It takes wholehearted commitment to become one of the sisters, and you cannot pursue a life at the Abbey if your heart is elsewhere. And …"
The Mother Abbess hesitated, " Maria…. there is something else, my child. I think you need to consider what you have learned from your time at the villa about where your true vocation is, what life you were meant to live. If you have found it in your heart to love this man, these children … then perhaps…"
Somewhere in her mind, Maria heard a door click shut, the door to the only future she had ever imagined for herself. Confusion and fear roiled within her. "Please Mother, don't close that door. I'm scared. I have wanted to be a nun since I was a girl!"
"Maria. When the Lord closes a door, he opens a window. He will never abandon you and neither will I. But Maria, even if your future lies here at the Abbey, you must go back. You must find out. Now go. There are some clothes in the robing room for you."
As if in a dream – or a nightmare, perhaps – Maria kissed the Mother Abbess' hand and left the room. Reverend Mother cannot imagine the only future that awaits me at the villa. What would she say if she knew she might be sending me back to become a . . . She could not finish the sentence, not even to herself. I will see him one more time, and then I will know what to do, I will figure out what comes next.
Within the hour, Maria was on the bus back to Aigen. It was a beautiful day – warm, with a gentle breeze rustling through the trees, sun-yellow late-summer flowers nodding to her from the side of the road, clouds sailing above, all that natural beauty making her feel even more alone with her misery. How foolish, pitiful really, that fresh faced young woman had been who had ridden the same bus, raced down the road to the villa and rung the doorbell months before. The things that worried her then – being responsible for seven youngsters, adjusting to her tyrannical employer – had not been so hard after all. Now, she was terrified of things she would not even have understood when she first came to Aigen.
She thought back to her first, disturbing encounters with the Captain. How shocked she'd been at the way he treated his children! Maria was horrified and disillusioned. She had grown up without parents and had carried in her heart for many years an ideal vision of how things could be for children with even one loving parent. His aloof treatment of his children, and his harsh sarcasm toward her, filled her with sympathy toward her young charges and helped her through the early days when they tested her patience at every turn.
By the time he returned from Vienna, Maria had already learned that things were more complicated than they appeared. The older children told her stories of a father who had romped through the house with them, who always had time for each of them, who took pride in their accomplishments. "He is angry with us because Mother died," Louisa told her, in her direct way, one afternoon, and while Liesl and Friedrich rushed to their father's defense, they did not really challenge their sister on the fundamental point: something had gone wrong when their mother died. Apparently, while the children had adjusted to her loss, their father – a national hero, knighted for bravery in battle – could not. There were no pictures of the children's mother – and that is how she was always referred to – anywhere in the house, although Liesl had shown her a small locket with her mother's photo secreted away in her bureau: "Please don't tell Father I kept it, Fraulein."
Surely, Maria had wondered, if he is talking about marrying again, there is some small part of his heart that is still capable of loving and being loved? Maria's natural, kind-hearted sympathy was aroused. She dreamed of welcoming the Captain and his bride-to-be back from Vienna. With a little coaching from their governess, the children would be irresistible to Baroness Schrader, who would naturally fall in love with them immediately, and their old father would be restored to them. Maria even daydreamed about the way he'd thank her, stiffly, formally. How proud she'd be when she reported her success to the Mother Abbess!
Of course, it hadn't turned out that way at all, at least not exactly. The Captain was furious when he returned to learn that his children had been traipsing through the countryside, seven urchins dressed in rags. One glimpse of the elegant Baroness, and Maria could understand why. Disheartened, and disappointed on the children's behalf, Maria had lashed out at him, had stopped just short of telling him that she loved his children more than he did. She'd been outraged, her heart pounding so hard with righteous anger that she barely heard the children begin singing for the Baroness until he asked about the sound.
And then . . . she could not believe her eyes, or her ears, when he joined them in song, when he gathered them in his arms, when Gretl nestled in the Baroness' lap. Later that same night, tucking seven happy, exhausted children into bed, and turning the Captain's heartfelt apology over in her mind, Maria had thought , I got through to him! For once, my temper has served some useful purpose. It's a happy ending, like one of the little girls' fairy tales.
It was only now, months later, riding the bus back to Aigen, that Maria knew that day was when things started to go wrong for her. Oh, at first, nothing seemed to have changed very much. She went about her daily routine with the children while the Captain entertained the Baroness and Herr Detweiler. He did make an effort to spend time every day with the children, often taking one or two of them for a swim or a horseback ride. He snapped at the children less often. But with his guests, and with her, he could still be moody and irritable, barking orders at her as though she were serving on one of his ships. He spent a great deal of time in his study, where he appeared to be immersing himself in the gloomy political news from Berlin and Vienna.
Maria found herself watching the Captain carefully, collecting bits of information about him, trying to fit together what she knew about this complicated man into some kind of understandable picture although it would have to be one of those pictures by Senor Picasso, she thought, a jumble of images and elements that looked like no recognizable person. He was an aristocrat, a war hero, yet humble enough to apologize to an insubordinate governess, to treat his staff with courtesy. He was a traditionalist who encouraged his daughters to excel at math and Latin. He had an engineer's orderly mind, but she learned that he loved music, the more dissonant and impassioned the better. He was formal, almost always reserved, but unashamed of his deep love for Austria, and about his fears for his beloved country. She was impressed, but not surprised, when Frau Schmidt told her that he, alone among the local gentry, had refused to entertain Herr Zeller. In short, he seemed exactly what Reverend Mother had told her he would be: a fine man.
Maria especially admired the Captain's attitude toward rules. Having struggled with rules her whole life, yet wanting to be part of a religious community, she watched with interest as he encouraged his children to think independently while preparing them to take their place in the Austrian aristocracy. One afternoon, she went to the terrace to retrieve Kurt's sandals and found the Captain, sitting alone with a cold drink, newspapers scattered all around him, appearing unusually relaxed. Screwing up her courage, she seized the opportunity to ask: "Er, Captain? I was wanting to ask you, that is, I hope you don't mind… but sometimes, er, I wonder…"
"What it is, Fraulein?" he said, briskly, but his eyes were kind.
"Well, Captain, I so admire the way you encourage the children to think for themselves. Like this morning, when you challenged Brigitta to defend her choice of reading material, but let her choose the one I know you didn't approve of – oh, yes, I could tell, you let it go because her argument was so logical. And when Louisa told you she wants to be a doctor, you asked her right away what kind of medicine interested her. But at the same time, Captain, there are all these rules – what fork to use, and what kind of dress to wear for dinner, and . . . "
He shrugged. "It's a matter of choices. I want my children to control their own destinies, yes, the girls too. If they want to go out into the world, to explore Africa, to start a business in America, then that is what I want them to be able to do, just as I chose a submarine command even though my family, and the men I trained with, considered it an, er, unorthodox choice. And, Fraulein . . . " – the Captain gestured toward the morning papers, scattered all around him – "look at how the world around us is changing, and not for the better. They need to be prepared for all of that, too. I look around me and I can only conclude that Austria's best days are behind her. But, when they are grown, if they prefer this world of Sir this and Lady that, of dinners for fifty in stuffy ballrooms, of chattering empty headed ladies and dissolute unprincipled men…"
The Captain's gaze was fixed in the distance, and Maria felt for a moment like he was talking to someone else, someone who wasn't there with them, but then his eyes returned to her. "I can't make that choice for my children, so I am trying to make sure they are ready for whatever future they choose. And that they can fit into all of this," he nodded toward the villa. " . . . if it still exists when they are grown . . ." His face saddened. "It's the world I was raised in, and the world that brought their mother to me…" He stopped abruptly, as though he had said too much. She quickly changed the subject, feeling secretly proud that she was beginning to understand this complicated man and that he shared so much with her.
Maria told herself that her preoccupation was for the children's sake, that she needed to understand him better to find the best way to help him reconnect to them: to Friedrich, who as a young man had most missed his father's influence, to Gretl and Marta, who had no memory at all of their mother, to all of them. And, Maria told herself, she clearly was not doing anything wrong, anything to be ashamed of, when the Captain so clearly valued her advice, respected her opinion. As the summer wore on, they conferred almost daily, it seemed: about Liesl's desire for dancing lessons, Kurt's struggles with the violin, Gretl's bad dreams.
Somehow, one conversation led to another: she asked him to choose a military history book, and the next thing she knew, she was asking him why, exactly, he'd chosen a submarine command, and why his family opposed it, and then he was drawing precise diagrams on scraps of paper in the schoolroom while the children were changing for dinner. Or he would remind her to ask the music teacher for Liesl's new music, and before she knew it, she was seated by his side at the piano while he lectured her on the finer points of the sonata form.
Maria knew, deep down inside, that she was playing a dangerous game. Throughout her young life, she'd been seemingly immune to the silly romantic notions that infected her schoolmates . Perhaps, to keep her wits around her as she navigated a childhood spent in foster care, she'd not allowed herself anything so frivolous. But there was no denying that she seemed to have some type of schoolgirl crush on her employer, something that went beyond simply admiring his character. It was impossible to be unaffected by his many talents, his sharp mind and clever wit, or his physical appeal, with his deep blue eyes, his warm voice, his broad shoulders. In her limited experience she had never met anyone quite like the Captain. She felt in some ways they were kindred spirits, both of them fiercely independent thinkers, yet deeply attached to unbending institutions.
At first, Maria didn't let this schoolgirl crush – for surely that's all it was – bother her too much. He was safe, wasn't he, someone years older than her who occupied a social position comfortably miles apart from her own, and on the verge of announcing his engagement? What harm could come from it, really? Maybe it was good, in a way, for Maria to get this kind of thing out of her system before taking her vows. After all, wasn't that, in a way, why the Mother Abbess sent her to the villa?
But Maria was fairly sure that Reverend Mother would not have approved of, or even understood, howaware she was of the Captain, sitting next to him on that piano bench, so close she could feel the rumble of his voice, could absorb his scent, could hardly bear his arm brushing against hers. She was so mesmerized by his long fingers, by the way his hands moved across the keyboard, that an hour later, she remembered nothing he'd told her. "Captain, er, can you remind me again? It was Brahms, I know, but was it . . . I'm so sorry, I can't recall which piece you wanted Liesl to learn." He answered her courteously, but she as he turned away, she saw the smirk on his lips, and fled the room before he could see her blush.
Nor would the Mother Abbess have understood the shimmering heat that washed over her that night in the nursery when his hands had caught in her hair. Or the dreams that soon invaded her sleep, first dreams in which the Captain's hand covered hers momentarily as he passed a dinner plate to her, or they brushed by each other in the hallway, then dreams of picnicking with him on the mountain, the children strangely absent, and then dreams where she was dancing in his arms, his arm around her waist, his warm breath on her face . . . Maria awoke from these dreams breathless, euphoric, full of guilt, and curiously unsettled. When they danced together that last night at the ball, it was as though one of those dreams had come true.
By the evening of the ball, Maria knew she was firmly in forbidden territory. For the first time, she was conscious of being different from the ladies who thronged through the villa and around the Captain, their jewels sparkling, their beautiful gowns swirling around them as they waltzed, each surrounded by a cloud of perfumed air. She had felt uncomfortable the whole night, a plain ugly duckling like the one in Marta's book of fairy tales. She told herself, I know I should not be yearning for . . . I know what Reverend Mother would say if knew what I was . . . There's no question. I must return to the Abbey, and soon! But . . . if I leave now, it will break the children's hearts. And they have been through so much! Just a few weeks more. The children will begin school and I'll be back at the Abbey. I'll quickly forget about all of this, I'll stop thinking about beautiful dresses and handsome sea captains and become my old self again.
At least, if she were an ugly duckling, she'd felt safely invisible that night. Most of the guests ignored her, of course, but she was used to that after a summer with the Captain's houseguests. Maria felt herself disappearing into the background as a governess should. I just hope for the children's sake that he makes a suitable fuss over the entertainment, they have worked so hard. Her employer had complimented her briefly on the children's appearance, but then he'd been pulled into the ball, absorbed into its glittering center. Keeping track of the children – she'd received very specific direction from Baroness Schrader about just what they were and weren't allowed to do – she was conscious of him, circulating among his guests, smiling, bowing, dancing the opening waltz with the Baroness. She found it hard not to stare at the Captain: he was impossibly handsome in his evening clothes, and the medal at his neck, a reminder of his heroism in the face of extreme danger, of his extraordinary bravery under fire, made a curious contrast with the polished, somewhat contrived environment that surrounded them.
Stop staring at him, you have lost track of the children, she'd admonished herself. It was a relief to find them on the terrace, to relax in their company, to feel the cool evening breeze on her flushed cheeks. This is where I belong. She was relaxed enough, indeed, that when she turned to find the Captain, standing there, smiling, extending his hand to her for the Laendler, she was surprised, certainly, but comfortable, too. I am having fun, she'd thought, as they moved together , there is nothing wrong with this! The children are right here, and in a moment he will return to the party, it will be as if nothing happened. And then . . . she had remembered the last steps, about the way the dance was going to end. She felt her face flush, and her heart began to race at the thought of what came next.
Maria closed her eyes, half-wanting to forget the memory and half-wanting to preserve it. His blazing eyes, his hand firmly on her waist, his other hand squeezing hers, confirmed what she already suspected. The Captain not only respected her opinions, listening to her when she offered him one of her good talking-to's, his eyes seeking her approval for his Edelweiss duet with Liesl: those things were flattering, the kind of attention people wanted from a nun.
No, the way his eyes lingered on her a moment longer than necessary; the way he had sat quite close to her at the piano even though the bench was quite large; the times had mysteriously appeared at the lakeside once she began wearing an old swimming costume she'd found in her armoire: this was not respect, it was desire, and it frightened Maria. It was one thing to have a schoolgirl crush on a safely unattainable man, and quite another to find him looking at you as though he might devour you, to come so close to him you can smell him, can almost taste …
"Aigen! Aigen! Fraulein, this is your stop!
Maria was jolted out of her reverie. She was almost there, only a few minutes' walk away from the moment of reckoning, when she would see him again. She tried to concentrate on the children, how excited she was to be seeing them, if only they did not blame her for running away from them. She was, truthfully, a little hazy on exactly what was going to happen with the Captain, now that the moment was almost upon her, the Mother Abbess' reassurances about the holy love between men and women fading with every minute.
What could she really hope for? Baroness Schrader had made clear that the Captain would never love anyone the way he had loved his late wife, and that she owned whatever part of his heart was left. The Baroness had probably told him about that last conversation, laughing with him about Maria's naiveté, her schoolgirl crush on him. What if he no longer felt anything for her? What if she offered herself to him – not that she had the slightest intention or idea of how to do that - and he responded as he had at the ball, with a careless "You can if you want to, Fraulein." She smiled despite herself at the unlikely scenario.
Or worse, what if he did want her? Would she even consider giving in? Maria shivered at the very thought, but her mind raced ahead. What would it be like to be with him, alone, in his study perhaps, or would it be in some remote part of the villa – she could barely think about it, even to herself – witih him pretending indifference to me in public, treating me like he did at the ball? What if the older children figured it out? And what would it be like when . . . when he no longer wanted me, when the fire in his eyes went out? Would I be turned out? Would I have to leave Salzburg? She knew so little of how these things worked – would it be a week? A month? A year?
She shook those thoughts away. I cannot be with him that way, she told herself, but she was not sure she believed it. Could I have been so wrong about him? I need to see it for myself.
Maria entered the gate, deciding to avoid Franz by going around the back of the house. Her heart pounding, she could no longer reassure herself that confidence alone would help her face down the challenges ahead. Look where confidence has gotten me so far! Instead, she concentrated on the children, repeating their names like a prayer: Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Brigitta, Kurt, Marta, Gretl. Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Brigitta, Kurt, Marta, Gretl. Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Brigitta, Kurt, Marta, Gretl. And so it was reassuring to round the corner and find those same children singing, sadly at first, but then their voices bursting with joy as they noted her arrival. They rushed toward her – how fitting it was that Louisa, the prickliest of them, was the first to embrace her – and then they all gathered around, her trying to kiss and hug every one of them at once.
"Children, I'm so glad to see you!"
"We missed you! said Marta, and the others chimed in. They swarmed around her, chattering, moving toward the house, Maria allowing her eyes to slide toward the house for just a moment, her heart skipping a beat simply at the thought that he was in there, somewhere. She relaxed as she realized that the children weren't angry at her at all, in fact, they seemed almost desperate to connect with her, almost every one of them holding her hand, clinging to her arm, leaning on her shoulder. She fell into her easy banter with them, commiserating over Gretl's finger, laughing at Kurt's empty stomach, offering Liesl cheerful advice about Rolf.
…and then then came the news, a blow more painful than any physical assault she'd suffered during her childhood. Years later, the terrible memory of that moment could still bring tears to Maria's eyes. Unsurprisingly, it was Brigitta, the one who was not afraid of the truth, who somehow knew she had to deliver the news: "Father's going to be married." The world turned dark and time stood still. She wondered if Kurt had noticed her hand on his shoulder, steadying herself, willing her knees not to buckle. Maria barely heard herself respond to the children. A wave of nausea swept over her.
She had barely caught her breath when the sound of the Captain's voice threatened to undo whatever composure she had left. "Good evening," he offered, evenly, his tone balanced perfectly between warmth and coolness, the smallest of smiles on his face - intended, no doubt, for the children. Breezily, he sent them in to dress for dinner, and then his attention returned to her. "You left without saying goodbye, even to the children," he said, gravely, his face unreadable even to Maria, who had prided herself on having figured him out. Was he angry at her for running away? Appalled by her schoolgirl crush? Simply curious? Possibly remorseful?
Seeing him reminded Maria, for just a moment, of everything she felt for him, as though the Laendler had never ended. The feelings washed over her: respect, affection, attraction, and something much darker she could barely name. But now, contemplating her from the top of the steps, the look in his eyes was . . . different, watchful, as though a gap had opened between them. If she had thought that one more look at him would tell her what she needed to know, she'd been wrong. The change unsettled Maria, revived her somehow. She was able to collect herself, to summon from deep inside that famously tenacious will that had helped her survive a miserable childhood. He is marrying the Baroness, and that is that. I can survive this. Can't I?
"It was wrong of me, please forgive me," she said, brushing away the Captain's questions, "anyway, the reason no longer exists." I will refuse him if he approaches me. I will never let him know how I feel, not if he asks, not even if he begs me, she thought stubbornly. Her determination only increased when the Baroness appeared, threading a possessive arm through his. Maria swallowed the lump that threatened to burst from her chest. Offering the couple her best wishes, feeling the tears about to spill over, she turned to flee for the safety of her room.
But he was not done tormenting her yet. "You are back to stay?"
For what reason? To keep your children occupied while you are wrapped up in your new bride? To entertain you when you tire of her? "Only until a new governess can be arranged," she snapped, and bolted, without waiting for a response.
She had a tearful half-hour in her room, alone, after leaving the terrace. Too soon, the tide of angry indignation that had helped sweep her upstairs receded, leaving her once again hurt and embarrassed. Why am I so surprised?, she asked herself. Reverend Mother may have thought she was sending me back here in search of true love, but I knew the nature of his interest in me. The fact that he has decided to spend the rest of his life with the kind of woman he's intended for – that has nothing to do with me. The only thing left to do is . . . She was not sure what to do. Once again, she ticked through the choices as she had on the bus, but with the new reality of the Captain's marriage in mind.
I cannot bear to leave the children. But can I stay and watch him live happily with his new bride? Seeing him again, remembering the man I thought him to be, makes it harder still to accept what the Baroness told me, but if she was right, and if he pursues me, will I have the strength to reject him? What am I willing to sacrifice to have an hour, a day, a month of what I felt during that dance, knowing he will never acknowledge me in public? And if I can even think that way, how can I go back to the Abbey?
When she heard the dinner bell ring, Maria drew one last shaky breath, washed her face, and changed her clothes. Her dresses were still in the armoire, and, not being able to bear the thought of wearing the Laendler dress again, she put on what she still thought of as her Edelweiss dress. She took one last glance in the mirror, smiled weakly at the pale, hollow-eyed girl that looked back at her, and hurried from the room.