Vigilantes Pt. 02 of 02

I'd wanted to make an impression and the huge knife with a blade fully as long as the barrel of the magnum certainly succeeded. I heard more screams in the audience as I bent down over Brandon. When he saw the Bowie knife in my hands, he instinctively threw his arm up to try to protect his face. That gave me just the opportunity I wanted, and I slashed the knife through his hair, cutting off a thick handful. Quickly I sheathed the big blade and then pulled out a plastic bag and thrust the hair sample inside.

"That should be a sufficient sample for the DNA test," I told him and the rest of the crowd.

When he realized that I wasn't going to slit his throat, the young man slumped in his seat. As I looked down, I could see a dark stain spreading through the crotch of his pants. But I wasn't finished with him yet. I reached into my jacket pocket, pulled out a packet of papers and thrust it into his hands. "Brandon Hilton, this is legal notice that you are being sued for paternity of the child you fathered with Lori Carleton Manning. You are hereby served."

I reached into my jacket again and produced a second packet. "Brandon Hilton, this is legal notice of a paternity suit in regard to the child you fathered with Emily Manning. You are hereby served."

I looked down at him with disgust. "Don't even think about trying to disappear again. I've already notified the Georgia Department of Child Welfare. They have a thing about deadbeat dads, and as soon as the court makes it formal, they'll be all over you to collect, no matter where you go." I yanked his head up again. "You want a prediction about your future, Brandon? I predict that for the next eighteen years or so you're going to do very little except work to pay child support for your children!"

With that, I scrambled across the table and onto the main floor. But before I left, I turned toward the old man. He stared up at me with a mixture of hate and despair. "Congratulations on your new son-in-law, Rufus," I told him with a sneer. "You sure are an excellent judge of character."

I heard a kind of primal scream from behind me, and I looked over my shoulder just in time to see Brandon make a grab for the massive handgun I'd left lying on the podium. He hoisted it, aimed it at me and frantically began pulling the trigger. I shook my head. "Don't bother trying to shoot me in the back, Brandon. It's not a real gun, it's a replica." Then I laughed. "Why don't you keep it? Consider it a wedding present from me."

With that I strode for the door as the commotion behind me reached hysterical levels. People in the audience were yelling at each other, Cecily and her mother were weeping in each other's arms, and Rufus was yelling at Brandon. At that moment, in a bizarre but strangely appropriate decision, the bandleader picked up his baton and instructed the musicians to play. I smiled as I walked out the door. "Too bad they didn't play 'Nearer My God to Thee,'" I thought. "That would have been the perfect conclusion to this shipwreck!"

In all the confusion, no one came after me. Or maybe it was just the memory of the Bowie knife still swinging from my belt. In any event, I managed to get to my car and drive off without further incident.

Once I was out on the interstate heading north, the adrenaline began to wear off and I began to shake. Then an enormous tiredness came over me. I thought about stopping to sleep, but it was more important to me to get home. For sure, I thought, I didn't want to be arrested anywhere near Savannah.

I rolled down the car windows to let the cool night air could blow over my face to keep me awake. As I drove, I thought about what I'd chosen to do. If I had killed Brandon Hilton, I would have wound up in jail, leaving my family destitute. Moreover, I would have deprived the two babies of the support that Hilton would soon have to start paying. I guess in one sense I had become a sort of vigilante, but I'd done it my way, within the law. I'd gotten a measure of satisfaction from Brandon Hilton without committing violence -- except to his hair, I thought with a smirk. I'd made sure that he would pay for what he had done and keep on paying till both those babies became adults. My daughter could certainly use the money to raise baby Bridget, and with any luck the extra income would help get Lori out of my house that much quicker. As a bonus I'd also managed to give Rufus Carleton his comeuppance, and if my little stunt had caused him to waste a ton of money on a fancy wedding, that was just gravy as far as I was concerned.

Whatever happened now, I felt good, like a heavy weight had been lifted off my back.

It was well after midnight when I finally reached our neighborhood in Atlanta. I was planning to try to be extra quiet when I went inside so as not to awaken anyone, but when I pulled into the driveway, the lights on the main floor were all on. When I started up the front walk, the door burst open and Bridget, Emily and even Lori came running out with tears streaming down their faces.

Emily was the first to reach me and she fell into my arms sobbing. "Oh, Daddy, I was so scared!" Then Bridget caught up and began trying to hug me while simultaneously beating my arms and chest with her fist. "Don't you ever do something crazy like that again, John Manning! What if they'd attacked you? What if someone had brought a gun?"

I gathered the two of them in my arms and led them back into the house. The two women wouldn't let me go, and all three of us tumbled onto the couch in exhaustion. When Bridget felt the scabbard pushing against her side, she made me pull out the Bowie knife and show it to her, along with the baggy full of Brandon's hair.

"I can't believe you took that thing with you!" she exclaimed. Then she looked at me quizzically. "You do know this hair won't be considered valid evidence, don't you?" she asked.

"I know," I said. "The court will order him to give a new sample for the trial. But getting this one was a lot of fun, and it sure made my point to everyone there. Besides, it scared the piss out of Brandon -- literally!"

Then a thought struck me. "How do you all know what happened down there?"

"I told them," Lori said quietly. "Cecily called me and told me what happened."

"Cecily called you? You haven't talked to her in years," I said incredulously.

"I know," Lori said, "but she had to call me to find out if what you'd said about Brandon was really true. When I told her everything that had happened, she told me she'd start seeking an annulment tomorrow."

I nodded. I was glad to hear the news.

Tears were still streaming down Lori's face. "I know you didn't do it for me, John, but thank you for saving Cecily from that monster. It's going to be very hard on her for a while, but at least she learned the truth now rather than later. Thank you for saving my little sister."

I nodded again. I'd done what I'd done for my own reasons, but I still felt better knowing that Cecily's life wouldn't be screwed up by that amoral bastard.

Despite my fears, the police never did show up at our house that night, nor the next day either. I thought for sure that Rufus would come after me, but apparently he directed his rage at Brandon instead.

Life for that young man went downhill fast. As she had told Lori, Cecily sought and obtained an annulment for her wedding, arguing successfully that Brandon had withheld vital information from her. Meanwhile, at the trial for the two paternity suits I'd filed, the court ruled that he was indeed the father of both Lori's and Emily's babies, and it awarded both women appropriate child support. With his vital statistics on record with the Georgia Division of Child Support Services, Brandon Hilton became a marked man.

The wedding reception became the tale of the year, and although the guest list totaled only 500, thousands of Savannans claimed to have been there to witness the debacle. Not surprisingly, Brandon left town shortly afterwards. I heard that he now holds a low-level government job with the City of Macon. What really surprised me was that Rufus Carleton apparently helped him get the job. I guess Rufus decided that Brandon's having a job was in the best interests of everyone concerned. Of course, after making two child support payments every month, Brandon doesn't have a lot of discretionary income left over.

Cecily and Lori continued to stay in touch with one another, and ultimately Lori moved back to Savannah. I guess without me Rufus was willing to welcome her back into the fold. Or maybe he realized that banishing his daughter hadn't been such a wise move after all. Either way, her departure was a relief to me. After all that happened, I wish I could say that I forgave her, but that would be a lie, and I was glad to have her out of my life.

Emily is still living at home, but she wants to find a place of her own soon. She's gotten a good job here in Atlanta and is taking classes at night towards her college degree. She's also recovered enough to start to re-establish a social life. Being a single mother doesn't make that easy, but Bridget and I are happy to babysit, and that helps.

Yes, Bridget and I got married in a small, private ceremony. She told me after my vigilante adventure that she wasn't going to let me out of her sight, so I decided to accept the inevitable and make it legal.

Now that my personal excursion into vigilantism is over, I've decided to write a book on the subject. Hopefully in the future my only involvement with those who want to take the law into their own hands will be academic. However, it seems that there's one potential vigilante still left in my life. My new wife took the Bowie knife and had it framed and hung over our mantle. She's warned me in no uncertain terms that if I "ever pull a damned-fool stunt like that again" she'll take it down and do some surgery I'll never forget. I think she's kidding, but I don't intend to risk finding out.