Chapter 8

The man's family were a delightful bunch. Despite his rough appearance, Herr Gedney was surprisingly quiet and gentle, who seemed to have a great lot of experience with younger children. In fact, I do believe he has already grown fond of Gretl and Marta in the brief time we have been here.

Frau Gedney was quite large, although I will never state this out loud because mother will scold me. She had red, curly hair neatly coiffured to reveal a round, warm face. There's something curious about her, perhaps it's her gentleness or perhaps it's simply her hearty laugh booming from one end of the room to the other.

Herr and Frau Gedney had two sons, and were expecting a third, although they didn't know whether it would be a girl or a boy.

Their eldest was around Friedrich's age, and yet at first glance he looked much older. He had hair the colour of chestnuts, which was frizzy and covered part of his tense face. His round, hollow, mahogany brown eyes were slightly narrowed, and I could tell that he was uncertain about us.

Their younger son was around Kurt or Louisa's age. Like his older brother, he too, was uncertain about us. Although not in an unfriendly way, instead he had tucked himself behind his mother, brushing his brown, shaggy, shoulder-length hair away from his face to reveal eyes, green like the sea after a storm.

"This is my eldest, Josef (Pronounced Joseph), and my youngest, Artur (Pronounced Arthur)," Frau Gedney pushed Artur out from behind her and towards us.

"Pleasure to make your acquaintance, boys. I'm Captain Georg Von Trapp, this is my wife Baroness Maria Von Trapp, and these are our children. Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Kurt, Brigitta, Marta and Gretl," father smiled warmly to the two brothers, who just stared at him back.

"Josef, why don't you take Liesl, Friedrich and Louisa out and show them around. Artur, ask if Kurt and Brigitta want to help you bring in the sheep," Herr Gedney told them.

Josef looked like he was going to protest, but a stern look from Frau Gedney made him think overwise, so instead he nodded to the door and began to slowly walk out. Artur looked terrified at this, but also held his tongue and began to lead us out.

"Oh, Brigitta wait," mother called, and I turned around.

"I brought a book of my own along. It's in Austrian and I'm sure it's as good as Swallows and Amazons, and I know how much you adore reading so you may as well give it a try," she handed me a small book, with a lovely colourful cover.

I smiled politely and stuffed it into my pocket, before running out after the boys, who hadn't bothered waiting for me. Artur was silent, walking as quickly as he could with his hands in his pockets, whilst Kurt was going on about something I couldn't hear. After a while, I had been completely forgotten about, as the boys had told me to go and sit and do whatever somewhere nearby as I would just slow them down.

Sighing, I took the book out and flipped open to page one. Bambi, A Life in The Woods. Oh, I remember my real mother reading me this when I was very, very young. A strange feeling made my stomach form another knot, which was so tight I thought I was going to burst.

It must've been quite a while, as by the time I had looked up the sun could barely be seen, but in my mind, it felt not much longer than five minutes. I closed my book and looked around. Kurt and Artur had gone, along with the sheep, and I was beginning to feel a little scared. Who knows what's out there at this time of night?

"Your parents told me to come and fetch you," I nearly jumped out of my own skin, before realising it was only Artur.

I seemed to be a little comfier around just one person, rather than a huge family. He eyed my book, raising an eyebrow.

"I don't know many girls you read," he helped me to my feet.

"Yes, well, I'm a Von Trapp," I replied simply. He smirked a little, his eyes twinkling with amusement.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked.

"It means I'm different. I'm not like any of my siblings, and they're not like each other," I explained, walking down the hill with him.

"I heard your mother talking about something called Swallows and Amazons. What is that?" he asked, curiosity hinted in his soft voice.

I kept my mouth shut, looking down at the ground. My beloved book, oh I haven't thought about it since I lost it. Now I'll never know who the burglars were, and if justice is brought to the Swallows as they had nothing to do with the break in… Artur, realising he had said something wrong, also stopped talking. For the rest of the walk, in fact, neither of us said a word, as we sunk into the raging rivers of awkward silence…