She wore a mantilla of black lace and waited for her Portuguese lover to return from the sea. It wasn't long before he arrived in the company of their daughter, a girl with eyes as black as night and whom Eleanore hadn't seen since they went to sea.

They paused at the door, sweetly reticent and appropriately formal after these years (Javier was nothing if not courtly).

The daughter asked to see the owner. It was charming, she had lost all memory of her mother it was clear. Eleanore smiled at Javier, but subtly so as not to embarrass the charming girl. It was something they shared, a recognition.

Outside the twilight sky turned from Delft to Dresden blue.

"Oh my darling, he's burning in hell by now," Eleanore said and smiled.

Though his corpse lay wide-eyed above, sunk in a tub of flowers.