I remember that when I was a child I was taken to a fair and given a
ride on a switchback railway. I was scarcely seated in the car, with the
straps round my waist and the giddy track before me, than I cried to get
out again. But the car was already moving forward, slowly gliding down
the first incline.
I screamed, writhing against the straps, "Stop! stop! I want to get out.
I want to go back!" But now the car was rushing giddily, in leaps and
bounds, down one slope and up another, whirling over bridges and gulfs,
dashing down the precipitous declivity with ever-increasing speed.
Even thus had I embarked, almost without realizing it, upon the rapid
slope of crime. Impelled by my own madness, I had started on the
vertiginous course to perdition, and now I plunged downwards, rolling,
leaping, rushing into the darkness, without possibility of pause or
return.
It was Kamarowsky himself who begged me to leave Venice for Kieff, where
some formalities still remained to be accomplished before our impending
marriage. He offered to accompany me, but I declined. He resigned
himself, therefore, though with reluctance, to allowing me to start
alone with Elise.
"Now," said Prilukoff, on the eve of my departure--and the transversal
vein stood out like whipcord on his forehead--"let there be no more
backing out and putting off. You will see Naumoff in Russia; send him
straight back here. I'm sick of this business; let us get it over."