Awareness returned slowly, a dim light in the distance that drew nearer, became gradually brighter… He blinked, and thought for the first time in… How long? He had no idea. He tried to remember what had happened, but memories eluded him. He was aware, but that was all: he could think, but not beyond the moment.

He moved, and lifted one hand to look at it. It was gray and bloodless. The skin was drawn tight over the bones, the workings of the muscles beneath the skin visible. Had he starved to death…? He understood, staring at his own hand, that he had died.

And returned from the dead.

He opened his mouth in surprise, and moaned. The sound was unnatural. He closed his mouth. What, exactly, had happened? He thought about it, and, slowly, the memories came back to him.

He'd been a preacher, and there'd been a revival. They'd been gathered together under the small, open-sided tent on the edge of town. There'd been close to a hundred folks there. He'd been leading the congregation- they'd been singing- and then he'd preached. He'd talked to them about immortality, about how a man might live forever if only he believed in the Lord. And then…

Then, there'd been startled cries; a sudden something going on at the back of the tent; and the dead man had staggered in. Three days in his grave, and he was back… He'd sat up in his coffin on the way to the graveyard (the coffin wasn't locked, because the man's family had wanted one final look at the late head of the household before he went down the hole, and he'd managed to get the lid up in the back of the hearse and crawl out) and the driver'd wrecked because he was staring in disbelief in his rearview mirror at the dead man getting out of his box. The driver had died at the scene of the accident, and the dead man had been thrown clear.

The congregation had scattered like chafe in the wind and the preacher had found himself face to pale white face with Death- and Death had taken him: the dead man had gone for him like a rabid dog and dragged him down and…

He stood alone beneath the tent, hearing the wind as it moaned through the trees, and he gazed out at the folding chairs, all empty now, and he realized that one thing if no other had come to pass: he had believed in The Lord and the Good Lord had granted him immortality.

He lifted his eyes to the heavens and tears of joy ran down his sunken cheeks.

Praise The Lord…