"Then what is wrong with me?" he asked.

"In layman's terms," Dr. Stein said, "do you know what thoroughbred racehorses and overachiever workaholics like yourself have in common?"

"We make a lot of money for other people?" Matt asked, innocently, after a moment.

Stein laughed.

"You don't know when to stop. You don't understand that you have limits like ordinary horses and other human beings," he said.

He turned to Dr. Payne.

"He's all right," he said. "I'll talk to him now. I'll page you when we're through. And on your way out, have them send two breakfasts in here." He turned back to Matt. "I've never known you not to be hungry. What would you like? Take advantage of my presence. I get whatever I want."

"I am a little hungry," Matt said.

"Send in the ward nurse," Dr. Stein said. "She's getting a little too big for her britches, and it will do her good to take our breakfast order."

"Okay," Matt said. "Amy's gone. That was a very nice breakfast, thank you very much. And now, I hope, you're going to tell me what's wrong with me?"

"I already told you what I know is wrong with you. Do you want to hear what your sister thinks is wrong with you?"

"I'm afraid to ask."

"She's been really worried for some time about you, and she's been coming to me for some time to tell me why she's worried."

"Is that ethical?"

"Ethical, schmethical. She loves you. She's a pretty good doctor. We're friends. She came to me. It's done-she can't undo telling me. You want to hear what she thinks?"

"Okay."

"She has developed quite a theory-basically that you don't know who you really are."

"Who does she think I really am?"

"Essentially, the psychological heir of your mother."

"I don't know what she can mean by that."

"That your psychological makeup is gentle, kind, even intellectual, maybe. Anyway, the antithesis of warrior."

Matt threw his hands up to indicate he had no idea what Amy was driving at.

"She thinks you have been conditioned all your life by your role models to believe you were destined to be a warrior, " Stein said.

"What role models?"

"Commissioner Coughlin for one, the cop's cop," Stein said. "But primarily, the legend of your biological father, who died heroically in the line of duty. Your uncle, the cop captain, what was his name?"

"Dutch," Matt said. "Captain Dutch Moffitt."

"Who similarly died heroically in the line of duty, right?"

"He had just finished telling some kid to put the gun down, he didn't want to have to kill him, and some goddamn junkie shot him with a.22, of all goddamn weapons."

"But heroically, right?"

"I suppose."

"And he died heroically right at the time when the Marine Corps told you, 'No, thanks, you don't measure up to our standards,' right?"

"They found something wrong with my ear," Matt said.

"All of these things combining, in the Dr. Amy Payne theory of what's wrong with Little Brother, to compel you to join the police force to prove your manhood, that you're a warrior."

"Jesus!"

"And then you met another man, who became your mentor, Inspector Peter Wohl. Another warrior role model."

"Okay."

"Now, being as intelligent as you are, you could not have been unaware, in Amy's theory, that Role Model One, Commissioner Coughlin, had arranged for a job for you that was not really police work. You weren't walking around dark streets in a uniform with a gun and a nightstick, in other words. And you subconsciously understood this to mean that Coughlin and Wohl, Role Model Two, didn't think of you as a fellow warrior, but rather as sort of a wimp who had to be protected."

"She told you all of this?" Matt asked.

"And then you shot the Northwest serial rapist, trying to prove that you were indeed a warrior and a man."

"I wasn't trying to prove anything. I shot that sonofabitch because he was trying to run me over with a van."

"But still, even after this warrior act, neither Coughlin nor Wohl was convinced that you were a warrior. The proof of this, your subconscious believed, came on the memorable day when the real cops, the real warriors, were about to face down the bad people and they sent you a block away to safety, allegedly to protect a journalist."

"I must be crazy, I'm starting to think she may be onto something."

"I'm not finished. She's given this a lot of thought."

"Go on."

"And again you risked your life to prove you were a man, a warrior, when a bad guy appeared in the alley and you faced up to him."

"He was shooting at us! What was I supposed to do?"

"You're an intelligent young man. You should have ducked, run away. You were driven by the need to prove your masculinity."

"My God!"

"And going off at somewhat of a tangent, Dr. Payne feels that your interest in so many members of the opposite sex is really a manifestation of your need to prove your manhood, carnally. And that, of course, is another proof, she feels, that you doubt your own manhood."

"And all this time, I thought she was my friend."

"She spoke to me as one physician to another. Give her that much, Matt. This was not idle gossip."

"What else did she have to say?"

"You next began to prove your manhood by becoming a detective, and then a sergeant, in the latter case studying obsessively because it was obsessively so important to you that you do well-preferably better than anyone else- on the examination."

"Anything else?"

"You told her, I think, that you were having nightmares about what happened in Doylestown?"

"And ten seconds after I did, I realized it was a mistake."

"You ever have them about the other shootings, Matt?"

"What the hell, the cow's out of the barn. Yeah. Most of them are about Doylestown, but every once in a while I have one about the guy who tried to run me down in the van, and now I suppose I'll have them about the guy I just shot outside La Famiglia."

"You said, 'The guy in the van, the guy I just shot.' But 'Doylestown'?"

"I didn't shoot anybody in Doylestown," Matt said. "The guy we were after shot the girl who took us to him."

"That's all she was to you?"

Matt thought that over, then shrugged.

"No. I thought I was in love with her. I had to prove my manhood, I guess."

Dr. Stein grunted.

"Amy thinks that your weeping over the girl in Doylestown was the first manifestation of your impending, uncontrollable psychological problems, and she feels the nightmares tend to confirm that theory."

Matt looked at him but didn't reply.

"You then were promoted to sergeant, and given your choice of assignment, and chose Homicide, primarily because Homicide is considered thene plus ultra of warrior assignments in the police department."

Matt shook his head.

"The warriors-Amy's term-are Highway, the Bomb Squad…not Homicide," he said.

Dr. Stein shrugged but did not respond directly.

"Where you were immediately plunged into things beyond your capacity to deal with," he went on, "and to which you applied all of your best efforts. That, she believes, would have, so to speak, pushed you over the edge in and of itself, but then you became involved in this last incident, two nights ago, and that finally produced the inevitable result. You experienced an emotional meltdown, so to speak."

"Well, I guess she's got my number, doesn't she?"

"She believes she has correctly assessed the situation."

"And what does my all-wise sister think I should do about it?"

"That's pretty clear to her too. She thinks you should face who you really are, and that done, take the appropriate action, which would be for you to resign from the police force, go back to law school, and assume a more suitable life for someone with your psychological makeup."

"And you agree, right?"