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audibly. “Well . . .” His brow furrowed, and he thought so hard, Martin
wondered why
they couldn’t hear the gears in his brain cranking. “Well, who’ll know that
except you and him? “ He hooked a thumb in Martin’s direction. Christina lifted her
eyebrows and smiled a question at Martin. He didn’t scowl at her, but it was an
effort.
    Grandmother Mayhew chose that moment to pipe in with her own comment
on the situation. “It’s not as if it matters,” she said to Martin,
ignoring the
driver. “Nobody who pays good money to see this idiotic moving picture is
going to know Egypt from Ethiopia in the first place. They’re all morons and
fools.”
    Martin stiffened. He knew he shouldn’t take
exception to
anything Mrs. Mayhew said, because she was only being offensive to get
reactions from people. But it galled him when people made blanket
disparaging comments about the pictures, which he loved above all else in the
world.
    “ Gran,” Christina said, before Martin could
think of anything polite to say that would yet repudiate
the old bat’s
statement, “Martin works in the pictures because he loves them as an art form and a means
of creative
expression. There’s nothing intrinsically moronic about them, and you
shouldn’t say things like that.”
    “ Balderdash,” grumbled Gran.
    Martin swallowed the bitter words he’d been
thinking, and
glanced with wonder at Christina. She gave him such an understanding smile that
his knees went weak for a second. “Yes, well, none of this will
solve our
problem, will it?” she asked sweetly.
    “ I ain’t takin’ them camels back to Beattie’s,”
the driver declared. “That wasn’t the deal. I’ve gotta
pick up two
elephants in San Berdoo and haul ‘em back to El Monte now . I
ain’t got room for no camels.”
    Martin frowned at the man and was trying to think of a way out of this
mess when Christina touched the hand tugging at his hair, and he nearly
jumped out of
his skin. Her touch had been soft and gentle, but he’d felt it like an
electrical shock.
    “ Please, Martin,” she said, and her voice was
soft and gentle, too, “I don’t think you should worry about the camels
right now. Maybe we can use hair dye on them or something.”
    “ Fah,”
said Gran. “I tell you, it doesn’t matter.”
    With a little shrug and a tender smile, Christina said, “You know, Martin, she might be right.
There aren’t
really too many people in the world who know Egyptian camels are blond. And
these guys”—she patted the nearest camel, who looked at her as if he were
offended— “ will be photographed in black and white, so it might
not matter much “
    For some reason, all the frustration and anger that had been building up
in Martin’s chest vanished. It was an odd thing, he thought, but as soon
as Christina’s hand had touched his, his tension
evaporated. He looked at her and opened his mouth to tell her so, but realized
how foolish it would sound if he mentioned it, so he held his tongue.
    Instead, he turned to the driver. “Tell you what. Miss Mayhew has a
good point there.”
    The camel driver, glancing at Christina, looked as if he agreed, but
not necessarily about Christina’s spoken point. He looked as though he
wished he could devour Christina for dinner.
    Martin continued, knowing the driver wouldn’t get anywhere with
Christina along the lines of seduction as long as Christina’s grandmother
was around and armed with that blasted cane of hers. “So I’ll
accept the
delivery of these camels, and we can see how they look on
celluloid.”
    He gestured to a group of four men holding leads that were destined
to be hooked onto the camels’ bridles. “You can get the camels into their
pens, fellows. I’ll have to decide whether we can use them after we see how they look
on film.”
    The men were animal trainers often used by the Peerless Studio. The
studio regularly needed horses and cattle for cowboy pictures, and this wasn’t
the