Moving Pictures

desert bandits ride in single file, though,” said the youth. “It’s not like, you know, a massed attack.”
    “Sure, sure,” said Dibbler dismissively. “Makes sense. We just put a card up where the leader says, he says—” He thought for a second. “He says, ‘Follow me in single file, bwanas, to fool the hated enemy,’ OK?”
    He nodded at Victor. “Have you met my nephew Soll?” he said. “Keen lad. Been nearly to school and everything. Brought him out here yesterday. He’s Vice-President in Charge of Making Pictures.”
    Soll and Victor exchanged nods.
    “I don’t think ‘bwanas’ is the right word, Uncle,” said Soll.
    “It’s Klatchian, isn’t it?” said Dibbler.
    “Well, technically, but I think it’s the wrong part of Klatch and maybe ‘effendies’ or something—”
    “Just so long as it’s foreign,” said Dibbler with an air that suggested the matter was settled. He patted Victor on the back again. “OK, kid, get into costume.” He chuckled. “A hundred camels! What a mind!”
    “Excuse me, Mr. Dibbler,” said the poster artist, who had been hovering uneasily, “I don’t understand this bit here…”
    Dibbler snatched the paper from him.
    “Which bit?” he snapped.
    “Where you’re describing Miss De Syn—”
    “It’s obvious,” said Dibbler. “What we want here is to conjure up the exotic, alluring yet distant romance of pyramid-studded Klatch, right, so nat’r’ly we gotta use the symbol of a mysterious and unscrutable continent, see? Do I have to explain everything to everyone all the time?”
    “It’s just that I thought—” the artist began.
    “Just do it!”
    The artist looked down at the paper. “‘She has the face,’” he read, “‘of a Spink.’”
    “Right,” said Dibbler. “Right!”
    “I thought maybe Sphinx—”
    “Will you listen to the man?” said Dibbler, talking to the sky again. He glared at the artist. “She doesn’t look like two of them, does she? One Spink, two Spinks. Now get on with it. I want those posters all around the city first thing tomorrow.”
    The artist gave Victor an agonized look he was coming to recognize. Everyone around Dibbler wore them after a while.
    “Right you are, Mr. Dibbler,” he said.
    “Right.” Dibbler turned to Victor.
    “Why aren’t you changed?” he said.
    Victor ducked quickly into a tent. A little old lady 10 shaped like a cottage loaf helped him into a costume apparently made of sheets inexpertly dyed black, although given the current state of accommodation in Holy Wood they were probably just sheets taken off a bed at random. Then she handed him a curved sword.
    “Why’s it bent?” he asked.
    “I think it’s meant to be, dear,” she said doubtfully.
    “I thought swords had to be straight,” said Victor. Outside, he could hear Dibbler asking the sky why everyone was so stupid.
    “Perhaps they start out straight and go bendy with use,” said the old lady, patting him on the hand. “A lot of things do.”
    She gave him a bright smile. “If you’re all right, dear, I’d better go and help the young lady, in case any little dwarfs is peering in at her.”
    She waddled out of the tent. From the tent next door came a metallic chinking noise and the sound of Ginger’s voice raised in complaint.
    Victor made a few experimental slashes with the sword.
    Gaspode watched him with his head on one side.
    “What’re you supposed to be?” he said at last.
    “A leader of a pack of desert bandits, apparently,” said Victor. “Romantic and dashing.”
    “Dashing where?”
    “Just dashing generally, I guess. Gaspode, what did you mean when you said it’s got Dibbler?”
    The dog gnawed at a paw.
    “Look at his eyes,” he said. “They’re even worse than yours.”
    “Mine? What’s wrong with mine?”
    Detritus the troll stuck his head through the tent flaps.
    “Mr. Dibbler says he wants you now,” he said.
    “Eyes?” said Victor. “Something about my eyes?”
    “Woof.”
    “Mr. Dibbler says—” Detritus began.
    “All right, all right! I’m coming!”
    Victor stepped out of his tent at the same time as Ginger stepped out of hers. He shut his eyes.
    “Gosh, I’m sorry,” he babbled. “I’ll go back and wait for you to get dressed…”
    “I am dressed.”
    “Mr. Dibbler says—” said Detritus, behind them.
    “Come on,” said Ginger, grabbing his arm. “We mustn’t keep everyone waiting.”
    “But you’re…your…” Victor looked down, which