cades." - He concluded with
undisguised disgust.

"I need help with this client, Milton," - I interjected - "and you are
not helping me at all."

He chuckled sarcastically:

"How often do I hear it from my patients?"

"She is not paranoid, you know. Her mind is sharp and crystal-clear and
balanced."

He nodded wearily:

"That's what confounds us with this syndrome. The patients are 'normal'
by any definition of this word that you care to adopt. They are only
convinced that family members, friends, even neighbors are being
substituted for - and, of course, they are not."

He crouched next to my seat:

"Soon, she will begin to doubt you and then herself. Next time she
catches her own reflection in a mirror or a window, she will start to
question her own identity. She will insist that she has been replaced by
an entity from outer space or something. She is bad news. The literature
describes the case of a woman who flew into jealous rages at the sight
of her own reflection because she thought it was another woman trying to
seduce her husband."

Milton was evidently agitated, the first I have seen him this way. As my
teacher and mentor, he kept a stiff upper lip in the face of the most
outlandish disorders and the most all-pervasive ignorance. And in the
face of our budding, dead end love.

"What do you advise me to do?" - I mumbled almost inaudibly.

"If she refuses anti-psychotic medication, bail out. Commit her. She is
a danger both to herself and to others, not the least of whom, to you."

"I can't do that to her." - I protested - "I am the only person she
trusts in the whole world. She is so scared, it breaks my heart. And
just imagine what the family is going through: she even wants to change
her will to disinherit them."

Milton's pained expression deepened:

"Then you are faced with only one alternative: psychodrama. To save her,
you must enter her world, as convincingly as you can. Play her game, as
it were. Pretend that you believe in her lunatic delusions. Act the part."

/*3. Dinner*/

"Will you?" - Enthused Isabel - "That's mighty fine of you! I have
arranged for everyone to join me for dinner tomorrow evening. It's a
Saturday, so people don't have to go to work the next day."

"How very considerate." - I stammered and Isabel laughed throatily:

"Don't be so distrait. It won't be as awkward as you fear. Sit next to
me and watch the show as I expose these fraudsters and frustrate their
p