I look out my bedroom window at Mrs. Meriwether’s house. The lights are out, and the last I heard from Alice, Mrs. Meriwether invited her to stay the night again. I sit down on my bed, then stand right back up.

My phone says it’s 11:08 p.m. I make a lap around my bedroom and pull my hair up into a ball on top of my head. We’re no closer to finding out who’s collecting Titanic spirits, tomorrow is April thirteenth, Jaxon’s still under a spell, Mrs. Meriwether looks as worn out as I do, and my dad wants to move. I take another lap.

Elijah blinks in with a mug in his hand. I stop pacing.

“Passionflower tea with honey,” he says, and offers me the mug. “You need to rest.”

I stare at it. “What are you doing?”

“This was used even in my time to quell nervous energy. You have been walking around this room for the better part of an hour.” His tone is gentle.

I don’t feel like anything could stop me from being nervous right now. And Elijah being nice to me only puts me more on edge. “Just because you’re helping to solve this, and we’re spending time together, doesn’t mean everything’s suddenly okay between us.”

“Quite the contrary,” Elijah says. “The only reason I am here is that everything is far from stable. But it does not change the fact that you must get at least some amount of sleep, however broken it may be.”

“You know what I mean, Elijah.”

He looks like he wants to respond, but changes his mind. “Take the tea.”

I grab the mug from his outstretched hand and blow on the steaming liquid. “Did you find anything?”

“I have started searching Blair’s house. Nothing we do not know. Either they are all extremely diligent about not leaving any evidence or we have overlooked something important.”

I sip my tea. “Also, I can’t come up with one logical reason Niki or Blair would want to help collect the spirits of Titanic passengers. It’s possible Wardwell does for the historical appeal of it, but that’s a weak motive.”

“Unless it is not logical,” Elijah says.

“What do you mean? That it’s emotional or personal or something?”

“Potentially.”

I look up from my tea. “Actually, what if it is personal? What if we’re not looking at this the right way?”

“How do you mean?” Elijah asks.

“Maybe the Collector has a grudge of some sort—a grudge that directly relates to the Titanic.”

Elijah considers my words. “The Titanic certainly left a wake of financial and personal ruin. It is not unlikely that the motive could be linked. The only issue is that approximately fifteen hundred people died, many of whom we know little about, not to mention the exponential number of extended family members the passengers had in countries all over the world.”

“I know. But consider this…Redd said the Collector died when she was young and that he recently showed back up in her tea leaves. What if we start there, look at the town records for when she was a child and see if anyone stands out as being connected to the Titanic?”

“Clever. I will go to the town hall tomorrow.”

“I think we should go now,” I say.

“We?”

“I’m coming.”

Elijah raises an eyebrow. “You think that is wise?”

“No. But what if Mary’s right that there’s something significant about the thirteenth? Or worse, what if Redd’s warning is right? I don’t think we can afford to wait.” I slide my feet into my black boots and grab my hoodie.

Elijah and I walk the back way to the city clerk’s office. The hood to my sweatshirt is pulled as far over my face as possible.

Elijah turns down a shadowed alley next to a brick building and I follow. The town is uncomfortably silent, so much so that any tiny sound causes my heart to race. He stops in front of a door and reaches his hand through the wood. It clicks open. I step into the dark building. It smells like old paper and wood polish.

“Wait here,” he says.

“Elijah…,” I say, but he’s gone.

I look both directions, even though it’s so dark that there’s no point. A shiver runs down my back.

Elijah appears with two lit chamberstick candles. I jump backward, scowling at him.

He hands me a candle, and I’m fairly certain there is an amused look in his eyes. “This should be enough light to read, but not enough that anyone outside the building will see us. Just the same, avoid windows.”

Elijah leads me into a room of shelves full of files and folders. There are three round tables with chairs. Each table has a computer on it.

“It’s a mini-library of paperwork,” I say.

“Indeed.” Elijah walks to a nearby shelf and holds his candle up. “These are the records and local newspapers for the past hundred years.”

It only takes him a minute to pull a stack of binders and place them on a table. We sit down with our candles, and I’m reminded of all the nights we stayed up doing research together in the fall.

“We shall start by looking at local newspapers on or around the Titanic anniversary during Redd’s childhood,” he says. “Every year there is at least one article commemorating the disaster. And if there was a Titanic survivor or a survivor’s relative in Salem, it is likely that person would have been asked for a quote or an interview.”

“That’s actually really smart,” I say.

“You sound surprised,” he says.

“That’s because I am.”

He tries to hide his smile, but the corners of his mouth betray him.

“Elijah?”

“Samantha.”

“Thanks for the tea.”

He smiles, and for the first time since he came back, his dimples appear. “You are very welcome.”

I look away from him and I’m annoyed all over again. How dare he come back here with his thoughtful gestures and his dimples and make me feel this way. I clear my throat and change the subject. “You pulled those binders like you already knew where they were. How do you know your way around this place so well?”

“I spent many an hour here when you asked me to help you figure out if your family was cursed.” He flips through an old newspaper.

“Oh.” I remember that day I bargained with him in the secret study to help me. I thought he was the most frustrating person I had ever met. Still do. I laugh.

“Yes?” he asks, and looks up at me.

“Nothing,” I say, and open a binder. Go away, nostalgia!

For the next half hour we pull Titanic articles and flip through pages. The tips of my fingers get stained black from the old newsprint.

“This is so sad,” I say. “I just read a story about a woman who checked herself into a sanatarium after the boat sank, never again wanting to talk about what happened that night. People say it was probably the screams from the passengers in the water that haunted her.”

Elijah nods. “A great many of the survivors had nightmares about it. It is likely that the passengers in the water were pleading for help for the fifteen minutes before hypothermia set in. Many families were split up while evacuating. Can you imagine being in a lifeboat and wondering if that voice in the water belonged to your relative?”

I shudder. “I can’t. I really can’t. But why didn’t they help them?”

“Some wanted to. There were arguments in the lifeboats about whether they would be overturned if they went back. One man finally did. But he was too late.”

I pull another binder toward me and try to swallow the lump in my throat. I open the cover and instantly the candles blow out.

“Eli—!”

Before I can finish his name, he’s there, his hand on my arm.

I hear him strike a match in the darkness, and a small flame lights up his face. My heart plays a drum solo in my chest.

“What the hell was that?” I whisper.

“You mean ‘who,’ ” Elijah says, and relights our candles. “And I am not certain. The spirit came and went too quickly.”

All the hair on my arms stands up, and I shudder. The binder that I just opened is missing. “Is there another way to get those newspaper records? Maybe a digital copy somewhere?”

Elijah scans the room. “I will certainly look.” He hands me my candle and offers me his arm. “But at present, let me walk you home, Samantha.”