The Golden Man

Summary

The Golden Man by Philip K. Dick - The powers of earth had finally exterminated the last of the horrible tribes of mutant freaks spawned by atomic war. Menace to homo sapien supremacy was about ended—but not quite. For out of the countryside came a great golden, godlike youth whose extraordinary mutant powers, combining the world's oldest and newest methods of survival, promised a new and superior type of mankind...

"Is it always hot like this?" the salesman demanded. He addressed everybody at the lunch counter and in the shabby booths against the wall. A middle-aged fat man with a good-natured smile, rumpled gray suit, sweat-stained white shirt, a drooping bowtie, and a Panama hat.

"Only in the summer," the waitress answered.

None of the others stirred. The teen-age boy and girl in one of the booths, eyes fixed intently on each other. Two workmen, sleeves rolled up, arms dark and hairy, eating bean soup and rolls. A lean, weathered farmer. An elderly businessman in a blue-serge suit, vest and pocket watch. A dark rat-faced cab driver drinking coffee. A tired woman who had come in to get off her feet and put down her bundles.

The salesman got out a package of cigarettes. He glanced curiously around the dingy cafe, lit up, leaned his arms on the counter, and said to the man next to him: "What's the name of this town?"