I had allowed you to sap my strength of character, and to me the formation of a habit had proved to be not failure merely, but ruin.

Ethically you had been even still more destructive to me than you had been artistically.
The warrant once granted, your will, of course, directed everything.

At a time when I should have been in London taking wise counsel and calmly considering the hideous trap in which I had allowed myself to be caught--the booby trap, as your father calls it to the present day--you insisted on my taking you to Monte Carlo, of all revolting places on God's earth, that all day and all night as well, you might gamble as long as the casino remained open.

As for me--baccarat[46] having no charms for me--I was left alone outside by myself.

You refused to discuss even for five minutes the position to which you and your father had brought me.