"That, I think, is a matter of definition."
"Then, for the third time, what are you! Stop baiting me!"
Timmy's hand closed on Phil's—a firm, warm, dirty and somewhat calloused boy's hand that was unquestionably flesh, blood and bone.
"Take it easy, Uncle Phil." Perhaps he had pushed too hard. The dancing eyes veiled themselves a little and the intangible, indescribable magnetism somehow faded. Phil, looking at him, was suddenly able to see him and to think of him once more as Timmy, a boy with unusual qualities, but the same boy he had watched for years. He shook his head and felt somewhat bemused, as he had done once before.
"Look, let's get a fresh start, Tim, and stop going in circles."
"O. K., Uncle Phil." He was an eleven-year-old again, responding obediently.
"I've suspected for years that we didn't know the truth about you—that you were something special, something new."
"Well—" Tim appeared to consider it gravely. "Yeah, I guess that's fair enough. I'm something new, all right."
"For years, then, you've been concealing something—something that showed through whenever you made a slip."