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Dallas McCord “Mack” Reynolds (1917-1983) was a popular and prolific writer of science fiction from the 1950s to the 1970s.

As sci-fi writers do, he made plenty of bold predictions about societies of the future. Among the predictions he got right: a worldwide computer network, a “common Europe,” Social Security, and an economy based on credit cards.

Reynolds was an ardent socialist, and his beliefs inevitably popped up in his work. In the short story below, note how the angry young villain rants about some of society’s shortcomings.

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Optical Illusion

By Mack Reynolds
Published in Science Stories, December 1953

Molly brought my plate, silver and side dishes and placed them before me without fuss or comment. I was an old customer and one of the things I liked about Molly was that she never fussed over me.

I usually make a practice of eating after the rush hour but today I was early and the restaurant crowded. It was only a matter of time before someone would want to share my table.

I didn’t look up when he asked, “Is this seat taken?” His voice was high, almost to the point of shrillness in spite of his attempt to control it.

“No,” I told him, “go right ahead.”

He hung his cane, or umbrella, or whatever it was, over the back of his chair and fumbled his hat underneath it before climbing to his seat. Then he picked up the menu from where it stood between the catsup and napkins.

“Nothing fit to eat,” he muttered finally.

I said, “The pot pie is quite good today.”

Molly came up and he said to her, “I’ll have the swiss steak, Miss. Green peas, French fries. I’ll decide on the dessert later.”

“Coffee?”

“Milk.”

I don’t know what it was that first gave me the idea that the person seated across the table from me wasn’t a midget at all. Not a midget or dwarf, but a child pretending adulthood and doing a fantastically good job of it. As I say, I don’t know what it was that gave me the hint, possibly I’m more susceptible to such intuitiveness than the next man.

But whatever it was, he knew almost as soon as I did.

That is, he knew that I’d caught on to him and somehow it frightened me. The whole idea was so bizarre — a child, not yet in his teens, passing himself off for some reason of his own as a mature, if stunted, adult.

“So,” he said, his shrill voice almost a hiss. He put down his fork. “So.”

How can I describe that cold voice? The voice of a child… but not a child. Not as we know one.

Ii reached for the sugar which was there where it always is at the end of the table next to the salt and pepper and the mustard jar. I measured out a spoonful very carefully without looking up at him. As I have said, somehow I was afraid.

He said, still softly, “So at last a stupid human has penetrated my disguise.”

A human, he had said.

His voice was a child’s but his words dug into me viciously. “Ah, so that surprises you, my curious friend. You wonder, eh?” There was a sneering quality now, a contemptuous overtone.

I cleared my throat, tried to cover my confusion by taking a gulp of the coffee. “I don’t know what you mean… sir.”

He chuckled and mimicked. “I don’t know what you mean… sir.” Then his voice snapped over at me, even as he kept his tone low. “Why did you hesitate before adding the sir, eh? Why?”

He didn’t wait for an answer. “I’ll tell you why. Because somehow you’ve discovered that my age is less than I would have it known.”

He was boiling with rage, and in spite of his size and the public nature of our whereabouts, I was afraid of him. Why, I don’t know. Somehow, I sensed that — impossibly — he could destroy me at will.

I fumbled my cup back into its saucer, kept my face averted.

“You’re terrified,” he snapped again. “You recognize your master even as you wonder about him.”

“My master?” I said. Who did he think…

“Your master,” he repeated. “Mankind’s master. The new race. The super race. Homo Superior, if you will. He is here, my snooping friend and you, you and your stupid nation-divided, race-divided, class-divided, religion-divided humanity will never stand before him.”

It was hard for me to assimilate. I had come into my favorite restaurant for my mid-day meal. It had been a routine day and I had expected it to continue as one. Now, I had been startled so many times in the past few minutes that I felt I was in a state of shock.

“Oh, it’s been suggested before,” he went on, seemingly welcoming the opportunity to explain to me, to gloat over me. “The possibility that mutations would develop, a super-race, a super-humanity as far above man as man is above the ape.”

“How… What…”

He cut me off. “What difference if it was the atomic bomb, laboratory experiments, or only nature’s continual plodding advance? The fact remains, we are here, a considerable  number of us and in a few years, when we have developed our full capacities, man will hear from us. Ah, how he will hear!”

Long ago an icy hand had gripped my heart. Now it squeezed.

“Why,” I stumbled, “Why tell me all this? Surely you wouldn’t disguise yourself if you didn’t wish to keep it all a secret.”

He laughed mockingly. There was still much of the immature in him, super-race or nay.

“Because it doesn’t make any difference,” he whispered. “None at all. Ten minutes from now, you will remember nothing of this conversation. Hypnotism, my stupid homo sapiens, can be a developed art when practiced on the lower orders.”

His voice went hard and incisive. “Look up into my eyes,” he ordered.

I had no power to resist. Slowly my face came up. I could feel his eyes drill into mine.

“This you will forget,” he ordered. “All of this conversation, all of this experience, you will forget.”

He came to his feet, took his time about securing his things, and then left.

Molly came over later. “Gee,” she said, “that little midget was just here, he sure tips good.”

“I would imagine,” I told her. I was still shaken. “He probably has a substantial source of income.”

“Oh,” Molly said, making conversation as she cleaned up. “You been talking to him?”

“Yes,” I told her, “we had quite a discussion.” I added thoughtfully, “and as a result I have duties to perform.”

I came to my own feet and reached up for my hat and cane where they hung on their usual nook.

I thought: possibly man has more of a chance than these hidden enemies realize. Mental powers beyond us they may have, although they would seem lacking in the more kindly qualities.

But this one hadn’t been as sharp as he liked to think himself. Hypnotic powers he might possess beyond our understanding, but that didn’t prevent him from making a very foolish error. He Hadn’t caught on to the fact that I’m blind.