The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch

by Philip K. Dick

And such did not at the present seem very likely; Scotty had a will of her own, which was always dangerous in a woman.

He himself was a believer; he affirmed the miracle of translation—the near-sacred moment in which the miniature artifacts of the layout no longer merely represented Earth but became Earth.

She opened the door and stepped out in her swimsuit. And she had been correct; it took faith in things unseen to make the suit out at all. It was perfectly satisfactory, to both of them.

“I understand,” Leo said, and shut the door after him. And I have to, too, he thought. Must kill you . . . or couldn’t we both put it in a less direct way, something like they say about animals: put you to sleep.

She kept right on smiling, even up until he had cut off the image. It was the smile of someone who was not going.

In the seat next to him sat a pretty, frightened, but desperately calm dark-haired girl with features as sharply etched as those of a magazine model.

Isn’t a miserable reality better than the most interesting illusion? Or is it illusion, Barney?

And he felt panic, mercury-swift, fluid, pervasive panic; it filled him to his fingertips.