"May we come in?" Karl asked.

Annabet lost her smile. She stepped back and held the door open.

She showed them to chairs. Karl dragged his hat off his head, crumpling it in his big fists. He looked at Bertha in desperation, but she was crying.

Annabet hid her fists in the folds of her skirt and took a deep breath. "Gottfried's dead." She said it for him.

Karl nodded. Bertha dried her face and got up to put her arms around Annabet.

Annabet just stood there staring through the wall. "I had hoped he was whoring and too embarrassed to tell me he spent all his pay." She heard Karl clear his throat and focused on him.

"Gottfried was killed at…" He stopped when Annabet shook her head.

"It doesn't matter," she said. "He's dead. What good is he to me now?" Annabet was aware of Bertha and Karl communicating with grimaces and head jerks, but ignored them.

Karl eventually left. Bertha stayed long enough for Annabet's mother to return from the market. After a whispered conversation, Bertha left as well. Annabet let her mother guide her to a chair, but ignored her fussing in favor of staring out the window.

Annabet shrugged off her mother's urging to lie down. She did move, though, to a corner, where she stared at a half-finished cuff made of lace shells instead. It hurt to see what she couldn't have.

Johann clattered in that evening and crouched at her feet. He frowned at her expression. "Why the face? I brought you more patterns. One of them is new."

She started keening.

"Annabet?"

She curled into a ball. "Go away."

He swore. "Why are you crying? Did someone hurt you?" When she didn't answer, he shook her. "Who?"