The Sound of Music

- Reverend Mother. - Sister Bernice.

- I simply cannot find her. - Maria?

She's missing from the abbey again.

Perhaps we should have put a cowbell around her neck.

Have you tried the barn? You know how much she adores the animals.

I have looked everywhere, in all of the usual places.

Sister Bernice, considering that it's Maria...

I suggest you look in someplace unusual.

Well, Reverend Mother, I hope this new infraction...

ends whatever doubts you may still have about Maria's future here.

I always try to keep faith in my doubts, Sister Berthe.

After all, the wool of a black sheep is just as warm.

We are not talking about sheep, black or white, Sister Margaretta.

Of all the candidates for the novitiate...

- I would say Maria is the least likely... - Children, children!

We were speculating about the qualifications of some of our postulants.

The mistress of novices and the mistress of postulants...

were trying to help me by expressing opposite points of view.

Tell me, Sister Catherine, what do you think of Maria?

She's a wonderful girl, some of the time.

Sister Agatha?

It’s very easy to like Maria...

except when it's difficult.

And you, Sister Sophia?

I love her very dearly, but she always seems to be in trouble, doesn't she?

Exactly what I say.

Then say it, Sister Margaretta.

You may go in now, Maria.

Come here, my child.

Now, sit down.

Reverend Mother, I'm so sorry.

I just couldn't help myself.

The gates were open, and the hills were beckoning, and before I...

Dear, I haven't summoned you here for apologies.

Please, Mother, do let me ask for forgiveness.

If it would make you feel better.

Yes. Well, you see, the sky was so blue today...

and everything was so green and fragrant.

I just had to be a part of it.

And the Untersberg kept leading me higher and higher...

as though it wanted me to go right through the clouds with it.

Child, suppose darkness had come and you were lost?

Mother, I could never be lost up there.

That's my mountain. I was brought up on it.

It was the mountain that led me to you.

When I was a child, I would come down the mountain...

and climb a tree and look over into your garden.

I'd see the sisters at work, and I'd hear them sing on their way to vespers...

which brings me to another transgression, Reverend Mother.

I was singing out there today without permission.

Maria, it is only here in the abbey that we have rules about postulants singing.

I can't seem to stop singing wherever I am.

And what's worse, I can't seem to stop saying things...

everything and anything I think and feel.

Some people would call that honesty.

But it's terrible, Reverend Mother.

You know how Sister Berthe always makes me kiss the floor after we've had a disagreement?

Lately I've taken to kissing the floor when I see her coming just to save time.

Maria, when you saw us over the abbey wall...

and longed to be one of us...

that didn't necessarily mean...

that you were prepared for the way we live here, did it?

No, Mother, but I... I pray, and I try...

and I am learning, I really am.

What is the most important lesson you have learned here, my child?

To find out what is the will of God and to do it wholeheartedly.

Maria.

It seems to be the will of God that you leave us.

- Leave? - Only for a while, Maria.

No, Mother, please don't do that. Don't send me away.

This is where I belong. It’s my home, my family.

It’s my life.

- But are you truly ready for it? - Yes, I am.

Perhaps if you go out into the world for a time...

knowing what we expect of you...

you will have a chance to find out if you can expect it of yourself.

I know what you expect, Mother, and I can do it.

- I promise I can. - Maria.

Yes, Mother.

If it is God's will.

There is a family near Salzburg...

that needs a governess until September.

- Until September? - To take care of seven children.

- Seven children! - Do you like children, Maria?

Well, yes, but seven!

I will tell Captain von Trapp to expect you tomorrow.

Captain?

A retired officer of the Imperial Navy.

A fine man and a brave one.

Ηis wife died several years ago, leaving him alone with the children.

I understand he's had a most difficult time...

managing to keep a governess there.

Why difficult, Reverend Mother?

The Lord will show you in his own good time.

When the Lord closes a door, somewhere he opens a window.