One night, on returning home, he found a letter that had been slipped under his door. He glanced at the postmark, and read “Cannes.” Having opened it, he read:

Dear Sir and Friend ⁠—You told me, did you not, that I could reckon upon you for anything? Well, I have a very painful service to ask of you; it is to come and help me, so that I may not be left alone during the last moments of Charles, who is dying. He may not last out the week, as the doctor has forewarned me, although he has not yet taken to his bed. I have no longer strength nor courage to witness this hourly death, and I think with terror of those last moments which are drawing near. I can only ask such a service of you, as my husband has no relatives. You were his comrade; he opened the door of the paper to you. Come, I beg of you; I have no one else to ask.⁠—Believe me, your very sincere friend,

A strange feeling filled George’s heart, a sense of freedom and of a space opening before him, and he murmured: “To be sure, I’ll go. Poor Charles! What are we, after all?”

The governor, to whom he read the letter, grumblingly granted permission, repeating: “But be back soon, you are indispensable to us.”

George left for Cannes next day by the seven o’clock express, after letting the Marelles know of his departure by a telegram. He arrived the following evening about four o’clock. A commissionaire guided him to the Villa Jolie, built halfway up the slope of the pine forest clothed with white houses, which extends from Cannes to the Golfe Juan. The house⁠—small, low, and in the Italian style⁠—was built beside the road which winds zigzag fashion up through the trees, revealing a succession of charming views at every turning it makes.