Chapter 1 CHAPTER 1 Shamshine and Sunshine are not the same thing. Anybody with training can tell the difference. Just like anybody with training could tell that Winfred Pimsley was a crook. But he was my kind of crook. His antique shop perched on a hilltop just south of the ruins of San Francisco. On the Daly City side, little houses made of ticky-tacky sat back from the street, guarded by picket fences. Cars smuggled up from Mexico were parked across lawns, rusting steadily in the Pacific fog as they waited to get their plates changed. Kids playing hooky raced bikes held together with duct tape and resignation.
A block away in San Francisco, moldy Victorians crumbled onto shattered sidewalks. Wild anise poked through the cracks in the deserted streets. Even daredevil teens knew to stay out of the old city. The area had seen plenty of illicit psychopigment spills over the last thirty years, permeating the landscape with a thick emotional haze at odds with its appearance. As Tommy and I drove past yards overgrown with mile-high dandelions, the aging pigment''s mix of ennui and affection made me feel like I''d just walked into my dad''s old hardware store. Most antique dealers would''ve chosen a nicer neighborhood, but Pimsley had weighed the weeds against the ambient nostalgia and moved his operation from downtown faster than you could say "Falklands." That was the inveterate salesman for you: everything calculated to pull customers'' heartstrings before they passed the fence. We left my red Renault 4 on the curb outside the shop.
I made sure it was locked before heading to the cornflower-blue garden gate. Not that anyone would bother breaking into a clown car with a lousy paint job, but it was the principle of the thing. Tommy jerked open the shop''s stained-glass door and shouted, "Psychopigment Enforcement! Hands up!" A low-throated chuckle greeted us from the back. Pimsley''s gray pompadour peeked over the top of an overstuffed recliner. A lever thumped, lowering the footrest, and he stood slowly. His impeccably tailored pewter suit needed no smoothing, but he plucked at his pant legs to make sure they fell straight. I''d known him since his mane had been a lush chestnut, but he''d embraced the first strands of white as a sign it was time to go full silver fox. He''d always played a man of another era.
With his shift in hair color his persona had become even more outlandish. Sometimes I felt like I was talking to a parody of a 1920s matinee idol. But the sharp mind underneath cut through the gingerbread often enough to keep me on my toes. "Agent Kay Curtida herself!" He spread his manicured hands at me in welcome. "With her delightful cadet! I was just thinking of putting on another pot of tea." We weren''t there for a social visit, and he knew it. Getting information out of Pimsley always happened on his terms, but the beverage was negotiable. "Don''t suppose you''ve still got that coffee maker lying around," I said, producing a packet of old-school grounds from my navy fanny pack.
Pimsley''s smile cut lines in his pale cheeks. He looked like an albino lizard hiding its teeth. "I''m still waiting for the buyer on that one. Perhaps it will be you?" "Guys, do you have to go through the whole thing about the coffeepot every time?" Tommy asked, sauntering over to the vintage records lining the back wall. "Couldn''t you just drink the instant stuff like everyone else?" "Youth! That lack of patience, that burning urgency--what a thrill!" Pimsley sighed. "I will make the java. I have a new disc for you, Tommy, darling. Let me get the key to the turntable.
" He took the grounds and moved to a Victorian rolltop desk. Reaching for a hidden lever, he shooed me away. "This is not for the prying eyes of the law, Agent." I already knew plenty about his fondness for clandestine compartments, but I dutifully wandered off to look over his wares. Even with a dead-end case on my hands, the shop was soothing. Something about the abundance of stuff , the sumptuous piles of costume jewelry, the stacks of elegant chairs from another age. A cluster of Tiffany lamps shed wholesome, comforting light on a dish overflowing with currency from back before we had a thousand-dollar coin; a ten-gallon jar of marbles gleamed in the corner. Everything came in oodles and gobs.
In the cozy confines of the space, it was easy enough to forget that the antique bounty was a front for Pimsley''s real business. It was a poorly kept secret that he was involved in off-label psychopigment collection, plying a network of wealthy collectors hungry for the rarest of pigments: batches of vintage experiments from the 1980s or recent breakthroughs that had yet to reach even the black market. More than once, I''d waited across the street while a bodyguard escorted a bespoke suit out to his Lamborghini. After spending a good part of an hour watching one particularly geriatric patron make her way across the lawn, I''d asked Pimsley why he hadn''t set up shop in one of the big cities. "They all think I''m their special discovery. That''s catnip to collectors," he''d said. I figured there were other reasons but I''d immediately regretted my question. The less I knew, the better.
Our deal was that I didn''t peer too closely into the darkened corners of the store, and he kept me in the loop about the goings-on in the rinky-dink underworld of Daly City. If he ever needed out of a tight spot, he had my number. Our arrangement worked just fine for me--it was his tip that had led me to the cache of unstable Cobalt pigment that had been turning folks maudlin in San Carlos. That job had almost gotten me a mention in the union quarterly. Almost. Would''ve been the highlight of a career spent chasing hoodlums too dumb to tie their own shoes. Pimsley put on the coffee and started up the record player. With those two appliances running, we could have been back in my childhood, before boom boxes, microwaves, or the war.
Tommy settled into the recliner. The first time I''d brought him here, he''d jittered all over the place, anxious to get the scoop and get out. Over time, he''d gotten the hang of the gentleman''s rhythm. Now I wondered whether he would notice if I left without him. The strains of the vinyl 45 drifted across the room, a girlish voice soaring over a drum machine and the twanging beat of an electric bass. "What is it?" Tommy asked. "Bootsie Poots''s first single," Pimsley said, producing three porcelain cups with rose-pink detailing. "She was an R & B singer before Hollywood got ahold of her.
" "R & B?" Tommy asked. "Rhythm and blues, dear. Back before electronic tango took over the airwaves, there were whole radio stations devoted to it." We all listened to Bootsie croon. I thought I''d found happiness, but all I''ve got is something like hope. Tommy let out an appreciative "mmmmm." Pimsley''s eyelids drooped with pleasure. I tried to figure out what was so great.
It was just another lady trying to convince me she was having feelings. I found a pile of laminated paper clippings next to the Tiffany lamps. On top was a WHAT IS PSYCHOPIGMENT? pamphlet I''d seen in my high school nurse''s office. A cartoon dog said So it''s like paintball, but with feelings? A cat in a lab coat responded Sure. But any way it gets inside you--sinking through your skin, breathed in through your mouth, or eaten--it''s going to give you some gnarly emotions. I''d never understood why anyone thought talking animals were the best way to communicate with teenagers. Underneath the pamphlet was a stack of front pages from the San Francisco Chronicle , one of the local rags from before my time in the Bay. The first was almost twenty-seven years old, from April 23, 1982.
"NATO Enters Falklands Conflict, Declares War on Argentina." Then followed a litany of lost battles and blitzed cities: New York, DC, Los Angeles, Chicago. I flipped through, reliving Uncle Sam''s topple from the bully pulpit to the third world. "Military Confirms Deep Blue ''Psychopigment'' Involved in Mysterious Incapacitation of Leaders." I''d watched that press conference with my mother. Everybody had already known the blue stuff causing mass amnesia in our urban centers had to be a weapon. Newly anointed President Fletcher Rigby made the announcement, looking surprisingly unfazed for someone who''d been ninth in the line of succession mere days before. The final headline was from 1984: "Surrender in Mumbai Ends Malvinas War: NATO, China and Russia Capitulate; Argentina to Annex Great Britain.
" First time the Chronicle referred to the sheep-covered islands that had kicked off the war by their Argentine name of "Malvinas" instead of "Falklands." Pimsley hummed along to Bootsie Poots, carefully arranging bullet-sized macaroons on saucers. I hoped his information would be more satisfying than the cookies. "Shamshine," the Chief had said as she handed over the file on the case. The fake version of Sunshine Yellow, the prescription psychopigment Depressives relied on to stay functional. Any agent could tell it wasn''t the real thing, but if you were one of the thirty million laypeople filling your monthly prescription, you probably wouldn''t notice if the counterfeit had been slipped into your gelcaps. At least, you wouldn''t until the rip-off had permanently seared the capacity for joy from your brain. The legitimate happiness pills were big enough business that criminals salivated over breaking into the market.
The Yellowjacket Cartel up in Idaho had been the first to develop a cheap imitation. At the height of their power, they''d had infiltrators at every step.