“Call the boss,” the other painter said. Appearances could be deceiving; he was apparently the brighter of the two, after all. He reached inside his grimy, paint-smeared coverall and brought out a little card.

I waved it away, suddenly tired. “Who in the name of Christ would want to paint this place, anyway?”

It wasn't them I was asking, but the painter who'd offered me the business card answered just the same. “Well, it brightens the place up,” he said cautiously. “You gotta admit that.”

“Son,” I asked, taking a step toward him, “did your mother ever have any kids that lived, or did she just produce the occasional afterbirth like you?”

“Hey, whatever, whatever,” he said, taking a step backward. I followed his worried gaze down to my own balled-up fists and forced them open again. He didn't look very relieved, and I actually didn't blame him very much. “You don't like it – you're coming through loud and clear on that score. But I gotta do what the boss tells me, don't I? I mean, hell, that's the American way.”

He glanced at his partner, then back to me. It was a quick glance, really no more than a flick, but in my line of work I'd seen it more than once, and it's the kind of look you file away. Don't bother this guy, it said. Don't bump him, don't rattle him. He's nitro.

“I mean, I've got a wife and a little kid to take care of,” he went on. “There's a Depression going on out there, you know.”

Confusion came over me then, drowning my anger the way a downpour drowns a brushfire. Was there a Depression going on out there? Was there?

“I know,” I said, not knowing anything. “Let's just forget it, what do you say?”

“Sure,” the painters agreed, so eager they sounded like half of a barbershop quartet. The one I'd mistakenly tabbed as half-bright had his left hand buried deep in his right armpit, trying to get that nerve to go back to sleep. I could have told him he had an hour's work ahead of him, maybe more, but I didn't want to talk to them anymore.