VIGILANTE

by Barry Ergang

Moonlight cast the shadow of a cat, toying with its prey, on the wall. Otherwise, save for the two men, the alley was empty.

Weissman had long since estimated that the skinhead was twenty-five at most. As usual, he wore military fatigues and boots. The sides of his shaven skull were tattooed with blue lightning bolts, the center of his forehead with a black swastika—flesh-deep blazons intended to proclaim his allegiances; to elicit loyalty in the like-minded, fear in everyone else.

“You're jackin' the wrong guy, man. I got friends'll come down on you so hard, you'll wish you were never born.”

“This isn't a mugging,” Weissman said.

“Then why a gun and shovin' me around? I don't know you.”

“But I know who you are. I've kept an eye on you since I saw you with your buddies at the Aryan Pride Rally a couple weeks ago, and a few days later outside a post office where you were handing out pamphlets about the Holocaust.”

“A fabrication of the Zionist conspiracy!”

“Impressive,” Weissman said. “Mention the Holocaust and you go right into auto-response mode. Do you spend all night memorizing the slogans and lies? Those multi-syllabic words must exhaust you.”

“Scumbag, the Holocaust is a myth.”

“I have family members who were survivors.”

“Liars who deserve extermination.”

“Do you ever actually listen to the garbage you spew? You say Hitler wasn't genocidal, but in the same breath you advocate extermination.”

“The Fuhrer was a lone prophet who foresaw the Zionist usurpation and tried to end it.”

Weissman chuckled. “Your brain hasn't only been washed; it's been pumiced. Since you love slogans, you might like mine: ‘The only good Nazi is a dead Nazi.'”

He raised the weapon until it was level with the skinhead's face.

“I'm warnin' you, man”—his arms extended defensively—“I get hurt, my friends'll—”

“I know: they'll make me wish I was never born. I'll deal with your friends one at a time. You got lucky and drew first pick.”

His swagger returned momentarily: “You don't have the balls to shoot anyone, Jewboy.”

“I hope you appreciate irony,” Weissman said. “The gun is a Luger.”

The cat's shadow vanished when the gun exploded. The bullet made a mess of the swastika tattoo.