The Gifted Read Online Free

than open and staring at nothing except the beyond side of death, she decided as she peered at his chest. Yea, he was definitely breathing, but she couldn’t see the least bit of flutter to his eyelids.
    Jessamine had no idea what to do next. Go for help, she supposed, but how without leaving the man there alone? That seemed wrong. She moved another step closer to him. His felt hat had spilled off and dark brown hair tumbled down over his forehead. He could be a prince. Not one she might see after kissing a frog, but one from somewhere across the sea. Handsome and strong. Or at least strong before the fall from his horse. Now helpless as he lay there with his chest rising and falling but showing no other sign of life.
    She should do something. Speak to him. Try to bring him back to consciousness. Then he might tell her how she could help him. And whether he was real or just one of the storybook princes her granny used to make up to entertain her. Maybe she was only imagining him there in front of her the way she’d just imagined the tree lifting to the sky a moment ago.
    She shut her eyes and opened them again. He was there. Still as stone, but definitely there. She could see dark whiskers beginning to shadow his clean-shaven cheeks. A dark moustache sprouted below his nose, but he had no beard like so many of the brethren at the village. She stooped down beside him and reached out her hand toward his face. She couldn’t remember ever touching a man’s face. Her granny had no use for men other than the old preacher and the princes who populated her stories.
    “Dream them up,” her granny would say as she rocked back and forth in the chair on the porch. “That’s the only kind to have truck with, my sweet little Jessamine. You keep that in mind when you get older, child. Don’t be settling for just anybody. Wait for your prince. The good Lord will send one.”
    But after she came to the Shakers, Sister Sophrena told her the Lord had changed his mind about men and women finding one another and having families. He’d revealed as much to Mother Ann. She’d taught her followers that being married caused too much conflict in the world and was a sin a person did well to repent of and set aside. The Shakers tamped down on the normal temptations of the flesh by keeping the sisters and brothers always apart with separate doorways and staircases and eating tables. The Ministry feared even a slight brush against one of the opposite sex might plummet a Believer into sin.
    So it could be with her touching this man’s cheek. Her hand hovered in the air over him. The warmth of his skin rose up to her and she told herself she should put her hand behind her. What was that Bible verse where the Lord told his followers it was better to chop off one’s hand rather than let it pull one into sin? But what was so sinful about a touch? No one would have to know. She wouldn’t have to admit her sin of curiosity to Sister Sophrena. While the good sister said unconfessed sin was a burden on the soul, so far Jessamine hadn’t felt all that burdened when she kept a lapse of obedience to herself. She rather thought it was a favor to Sister Sophrena not admitting all her wayward thoughts.
    For years, the poor woman had tried to get Jessamine to embrace the Shaker way, but Jessamine couldn’t stop her wondering. And her wandering too. She wanted to know. She wanted to see beyond the village. She wanted to imagine. She wanted to make up stories about princes. And it would be good to know exactly how a man’s face might feel under her hand instead of just imagining it.
    “Is he dead?”
    Jessamine was so startled by the voice she almost fell on top of the man. She caught her balance and jerked back her hand as she scrambled to her feet. With her hand over her heart and a bit out of breath, she turned to stare at Sister Annie on the road behind her. “You startled me, Sister Annie. I didn’t know you followed me.”
    “I didn’t want to.