JOHNNY GONE DOWN Read Free Page A

best that he remained nameless and faceless.
    ‘How’s business?’ I asked instead.
    The thick muscles in his neck tightened. ‘There are a lot of gang wars, especially with the big cartels from Colombia and Russia stepping in to get a piece of the action. I lost two men this month. You ran Marco’s operations in India?’
    I shook my head. ‘I was with him in Brazil.’
    ‘How did you get there? I heard you went to MIT or Harvard or somewhere. You don’t meet toomany of them in our line of work,’ he said, his blank eyes showing a slight flicker of interest.
    ‘Long story,’ I said dismissively.
    He shrugged. Whatever, your hell.
    The car stopped in front of a furniture showroom on a busy street.
    ‘Here?’ I asked. It seemed an unlikely location for this diabolical duel. But where was I expecting him to take me anyway? India Gate or the Rashtrapati Bhavan, perhaps?
    I followed him quietly as he scanned the road with a practised eye and made his way through the smoked glass doors to enter the main floor, which was filled with sparkling new cane furniture. The merchants in the showroom stood to attention. He ignored them and walked to the back of the shop. We went down a flight of stairs into a dark, stale basement where a small door opened into a surprisingly large, bare room with a wooden table in the centre and a chair on either side.
    A man sat on one of the chairs, staring blankly at the light bulb above him, one of the two bulbs that lit the room.
    ‘This is Dayaram, your opponent,’ said the handler.
    He looked about sixty, six foot plus, solidly built, with just a touch of grey in his thick black hair. The handler was right. God knows I had seen more dying men than anyone should see in a lifetime,and he didn’t look like one. A little pale perhaps, but he might soon be blowing a hole through his temple, something that could make even the best of men lose colour. Dayaram got up from his chair and greeted me warmly.
    ‘Nikhil,’ I said, shaking his hand.
    Or Jet. Or Monk Namche. Or Coke Buddha. Or Nick. Different aliases for each phase of my life. Take your pick, none had worked.
    ‘I was worried they wouldn’t be able to find an opponent,’ Daya said in chaste Hindi. ‘Thank you for doing this, sahib.’
    I smiled slightly. He was thanking a man he was about to kill, or would be killed by in a few minutes. I liked him at once.
    ‘You have your choice of revolvers, but you both have to use the same one of course,’ said the handler, impatient to begin. ‘Should I toss a coin to choose who picks? We need to hurry before the audience starts coming in.’
    An array of revolvers lay on the table - .17 Remington, .416 Barrett, .25 WSSM, .35 Remington, .357 Magnum, .30 Carbine. It had been a while but I recognized all of them, I realized with some measure of pride.
    ‘No need,’ I said. ‘He can pick.’
    Dayaram looked bewildered at the range of options, just as I had been the first time Marco asked me to pick.
    ‘Just pick the one that feels most comfortable in your hand. All of them are equally effective,’ I said gently. ‘Aiming right is more important.’
    The handler seemed to like the advice. He picked up the Smith.
    ‘You need to point here,’ he said, placing the gun against his temple. ‘Just move the barrel around a bit, like this, until you feel the slight bump, then press the trigger. Don’t point anywhere else on the head. It will be slow and painful for you - and for us. Too much blood, too messy, and you know of course that going to a hospital isn’t an option.’
    To his credit, Dayaram seemed unfazed at the prospect of ending up in bits of bone and blood in a few minutes. He picked up the revolvers one by one, fingering each one gingerly, and finally chose the .35 Remington.
    ‘Good choice,’ I said approvingly. ‘Let me unload the cartridges so you can practise.’
    I took the pistol, unfastened the lock, removed the cartridges, and gave it back to him.
    The handler