Phil looked at her and the hours between were gone and he was back in the little tangled square at dawn and Mitzie was about to leave him, and all his snapping nervous tension flowed in a new and steadier channel.
"Darling," he said softly and carefully, as if a sudden noise might make her vanish, "Mitzie darling, I wasn't trying to humble you."
"Oh?" she said, tucking the lock of hair back of her ear.
He moved toward her very slowly. "Actually I was just being conceited and I was jealous—both of you and your boy friends."
"Be very careful what you say, Phil," she whispered fearfully. "Be very honest."
"All right then," he said, "I was trying to humble you; I was doing my best to. I was full of the sort of vanity and condescension that comes from understanding too much. I didn't know that your kind of defiance and glory has a place in the world. Mitzie, I love you."
He put his arms around her and she didn't vanish. The feeling of her body against his wasn't like anything he'd imagined. It was simply slim and quite trusting and terribly tired.
Then her chin lifted from his shoulder and he was shoved back about six feet.
Mitzie was glaring at and beyond him. He was relieved that she didn't seem to have a gun, or knife, or claws, or anything like that.
He looked around. Dytie da Silva, leaning against the bathroom door, was watching them quizzically. "'Allo," she greeted them cheerfully, then asked Phil, "Girl friend?"