Resurrection by Linda Lael Miller

wide-eyed, full of loathing, and a step beyond simple fear. “You,” she said. “You had my husband shanghaied.”

5
    G IL SETTLED THE AGED MARE IN A STALL, WITH FRESH WATER IN the trough and a ration of oats in case a bellyful of field grass wouldn’t sustain her, and strolled, whistling, out of the small barn. The sight of the darkened house gave him pause, and he wished, for one whimsical moment, that the walls were transparent. It would have been a singular joy to watch Miss Emmeline sitting at her vanity table, letting her hair down, brushing it with long, measured strokes, and, finally, winding the coppery strands into a thick plait. He’d seen her do that a hundred times in reality and a thousand times in his dreams, and he never tired of the sight.
    Just imagining that simple, ordinary ritual filled Gil with a yearning of unreasonable depths, rooted far down in his soul. He shoved splayed fingers through his hair in frustration.
    Emmeline was his wife, and for seven long years he had lived only to return to her. Now, miraculously, here he was, resurrected, back from the dead, close enough to call out toher. So why was he holding back, like a thirst-ravaged man denying himself water? All the while, the great unseen and unheard clock of the universe was ticking, and with every swing of the pendulum, there was another heartbeat used and gone, another moment lost forever.
    Gil was through considering, he suddenly decided, through letting fear and pique stop him from living out whatever was left of this grand, brief gift he had been allotted—his life. He would waste no more of it.
    He vaulted over the garden fence and started across the judge’s front lawn. He’d batter down the door if he had to, and when Emmeline let him in, he would offer himself to her, like a knight swearing fealty to his queen. You were right, he would tell her, it’s time to close our eyes, hold our breaths, and jump.
    Gil bounded up the veranda steps and over to the door, making no effort to be quiet. If any of the neighbors had straggled home from the revival camp to hear him, then so be it. Maybe he’d carry Emmeline right out into the middle of the street in his arms and turn round and round, to let the watchers see that she was his.
    She opened the door before he knocked, and though a shadow veiled her face, he sensed, even before she spoke, that something was wrong.
    “Go home, Gil,” Emmeline said in a strange, thin voice, gripping the edge of the door as though poised to fling it shut in his face. “Please.”
    “Come in,” countered a masculine voice from behind her.
    Gil’s heart spun over several beats, like a flat rock whirling across a sheet of ice, and he felt the absence of his holster and pistol as a phantom weight against his hip. Normally, he would have been armed, but he’d left his Colt at home that morning, not expecting to need it at an all-day revival meeting. Now, the hairs on his nape were standing upright,and his gut told him that that big clock he’d been thinking about earlier might be about to run down.
    He greeted the other man calmly, with a nod and a murmured “Montgomery.” As Gil passed Emmeline on the wide threshold, however, he eased her behind him, out onto the veranda.
    Any other female might have had the God-given good sense to run, but not Emmeline, Gil said to himself as he saw her try to get past him, back into the house.
    “He’s the one,” she cried as Gil barred her way. “It was Neal who had you shanghaied.”
    The news did not surprise Gil; in fact, it seemed so glaringly obvious that he wondered why he’d never guessed it. “This is between Montgomery and me,” he said firmly, his gaze locked with that of his old adversary. He did not turn to look at his wife. “You run along, Emmeline, and stay out of this.”
    “I’ll get Marshal Scead,” Emmeline said.
    “You do that,” agreed Gil. Scead was eighty-two if he was a day, and probably sound asleep in the town’s