Sam's frosty demeanor towards JB did not thaw as quickly as he'd hoped. She wasn't unfriendly, but she also didn't go out of her way to engage with him for the next couple of days. He'd grown accustomed to her vivacious chatter in Gévaudan, and the soft-spoken Mr. and Mrs. Daley—while very nice people—lacked the touch of passion that so often seasoned Sam's monologues. Besides, Mr. Daley was a banker and rarely at home during the day. Eight year-old Abby was quite the talker, but she and her brother gravitated towards Sarah, and Sarah was spending most of her time with Sam, as they had become fast friends. Sarah was short, with wispy blonde hair and large doe eyes. JB had thought Sam looked young for a thirty-two year-old, but Sarah could easily pass for fifteen even though she was in her twenties. And together, the two of them were like a couple of twelve year-old girls at a sleepover. At least that's how they sounded from JB's vantage point in the library. Even with the doors closed, he could hear the dynamic range of giggles and squeals from Sarah's bedroom across the hall while Sam tried on a number of dresses Sarah had set aside for her to borrow. From overhearing some of their conversations, JB had gathered that Sarah was more a member of the Daley family than an employee. Being the Daleys' niece, her accommodations and lifestyle were much nicer than most Regency governesses'. Apparently Sarah's immediate family used to live on a farm in the nearby village of Erdington, but her parents and siblings all died of smallpox three years ago, leaving Sarah the only survivor of the Carr family. She still had friends in Erdington, and the village's tavern was hosting a dance near the end of the month for Whit Monday. Sarah hoped the Daleys would let her attend if she brought Sam along. Needless to say, Sam did not want to miss an opportunity to wear a Regency party dress, and the Whitsuntide dance was now their main topic of discussion.

This left JB with lots of time alone in the library or hiding in the linen closet when he wanted to sneak a few hours of research on the elucidator. He still could not find a single thing about Jane Austen's death that seemed out of the ordinary, but at least it made him feel like he was making progress on something.

It wasn't until Saturday evening after he'd crammed himself into what he hoped would be an endurable sleeping position on the chaise-longue that Sam finally reached out to him.

He had just closed his eyes when a meek, "Hey, JB?" penetrated the quiet darkness.

"Sam?" he answered cautiously, without moving. It was like trying to catch a butterfly; one sudden movement and it might fly away.

"I can't go tomorrow," she murmured.

This was so unexpected, he suddenly forgot all caution and bolted upright to make sure he was indeed talking to Samantha Cretney. Tomorrow she and Sarah had plans to pick up Sam's new clothes after church. He thought she would be ecstatic, but the silhouetted lump on the bed above him just sat motionless.

"Why not? Are you not feeling well?" He made his way onto the edge of her mattress and gently touched her forehead with the back of his hand. "You feel normal, I think." It wasn't like he could really know what "normal" felt like for Sam unless he touched her face regularly. The thought of that triggered a flutter in his stomach, but he shoved it out of his mind and focused on Sam's anxious expression that slowly emerged as his eyes adjusted to the dark.

"I don't feel sick now," she said, "but I will if I have to set foot in a church." She hugged herself and stared up at him, pleading, "Please help me come up with a reason to stay here until after church. I'm sure all that God stuff isn't your cup of tea either."

JB suppressed a groan. Not this again. "Why do people from the twenty-first century always assume the future is devoid of spirituality?"

Sam shrugged. "Because it's stupid to depend on an ancient book to tell you right from wrong? What, do people in your time still spout scripture to justify crappy behavior?"

JB had never heard so much bitterness in Sam's voice. Evidently, there was more to this outburst than she wanted to let on. Treading carefully, JB said, "I can't speak for everybody from the future, but I believe in God and destiny and hope. How do you think I managed to help those missing kids from history when all the odds seemed stacked against us? How did Mileva Einstein slip me into the future without a single trace of damaged time? How did Katherine Skidmore save five people from a cellar full of raining bullets during the Romanov assasination with hardly a scratch? How did Jonah Skidmore make the exact right decisions at the exact right time to save his twin brother and his own dimension from collapse?"

Sam simply crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow. "You're saying God did all that?"

"I'm saying we were either very, very lucky, or it was all meant to be."

"If God is so powerful, how come Katherine couldn't save everybody from that cellar? Why did God just sit and watch while the Holocaust swept Europe, or when innocent people were being hanged for witchcraft in seventeenth century Salem?"

This was not the response JB expected. Usually people brought up science as a counterpoint to his beliefs.

"If there is a God," Sam continued, "he either favors some people over others or he isn't as powerful or good as everyone thinks. How could he be when people like my second foster family did such horrible things in the name of religion?"

JB had an inkling he was getting to the root of the situation now. "Who was your second foster family?"

"Well, it was supposed to be a sweet gay couple, until Mr. and Mrs. Turner—who'd initially turned down the opportunity to foster me—suddenly thought it was their Christian duty to prevent 'the sinful homosexuals' from raising a child. Their words, not mine." She scowled, probably to hide the trembling of her bottom lip. "They're the reason my OCD went untreated for so long. I used to tell them I felt guilty for stuff that had nothing to do with me and they'd say it must be because I had a secret urge to sin. It wasn't until they'd had enough of my compulsive episodes of inexplicable guilt that they gave me up and I went to a foster family that actually understood that I needed therapy and medication."

JB felt the outrage sizzling in his chest. He rarely lost his temper. But at this moment he wanted to zap himself into the Turners' home and strike them in the face with both fists.

He swallowed his anger and returned his attention to Sam. Her arms were still crossed, but her scowl had melted away and she just looked frightened.

"It took me years to shed off that constant feeling of guilt. I'm scared that going into a church could bring it all back," she said.

"I can see how that could make someone an atheist," JB admitted.

Sam shook her head. "I'm not an atheist. I believe in lots of stuff. Like, I'm absolutely certain the Hillside Museum is haunted and I'm pretty sure I've been reincarnated at least ten times or I wouldn't feel so…connected to to the past—" JB held his tongue "—I mean, I even believe there could be some sort of higher power, or existence of some sort, but I don't think going to church every day or memorizing scripture is the key to being a good person."

"Neither do I," said JB. "And I don't pretend to know much about fate and destiny and God, just that those are things I believe in and that have helped me throughout my life." Just then, he thought of something. "You said your favorite book was Les Misérables, right?"

"Les Mis is my favorite musical. It's one of my favorite books," she corrected.

"Okay, well, take the last line from the musical, 'To love another person is to see the face of God.'"

"That isn't the last line of the musical. The last line is—'"

"Okay, not the last line," said JB. Sheesh, and he thought he was nit-picky about details. "But would you agree it's an important line?"

"Only the most beautiful line ever sung."

"And why is that?"

A hint of a smile appeared on her face. "Because it's saying that God isn't a person or a guidebook. God is what you find when you love someone else, and salvation doesn't come from tallying up virtue and sin. It comes from loving others and accepting their love."

"And to me, that's what it's really about."

They were silent for a few moments, and JB tried not to notice how nice it felt to see Sam smile at him again. Eventually, he said, "I get it if you don't want to relive any bad memories. I can say your injuries are starting to hurt again and that you need to stay in bed until the afternoon."

Sam looked up at the ceiling, considering. "I think…I think I'll go after all. If you'll stay beside me the whole time."

JB could think of much worse arrangements. "You have my word."