After escaping from the Sudeten German Marienbad, Clara, together with her widowed brother-in-law Johann and his four children, is quartered in a small Franconian village in 1946. In addition to hunger and poverty Clara burdens the tuberculosis of her six-year-old niece Heidi. To raise money for life-saving medicines, she works as a harvest helper at Gut Braunfels. Here she meets the estate manager Martin again, her great love she had to leave because of the children. Immediately it sparkles again between the two, but also the power-conscious squire has kept an eye on Clara.