The final seconds tick away. Morrel raises the pistol, cocks it, and shudders at the sound. Cold sweat covers him; a crushing pain closes around his heart. The staircase door creaks. The clock prepares to strike eleven. His study door opens. Morrel doesn’t turn — he assumes Cocles has come to announce the agent of Thomson & French.

And then he hears a cry — Julie’s voice. He turns. She stands in the doorway, breathless, radiant, her hand extended. The pistol falls from his grasp.

Julie throws herself into his arms, holding a familiar red silk purse. Inside is the receipted bill for 287,000 francs — paid in full — and a diamond large as a hazelnut, labeled Julie’s Dowry. Morrel stares, stunned. The purse is one he once owned himself, long vanished from his life, now returned in this miraculous moment.

He is saved.

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Cocles enters the study to find a man utterly changed. The discoveries of the past three days have crushed Morrel’s spirit so completely that he seems aged by decades. The single thought — the House of Morrel is about to fail — weighs on him more heavily than any hardship he has endured across his life.

Morrel instructs Cocles to remain in the antechamber and to announce the arrival of the agent from Thomson & French the moment he appears. Cocles silently nods and takes his place outside. Morrel sinks into his chair and fixes his gaze on the clock: only seven minutes remain before eleven. He watches the minute hand advance with unbearable clarity.

In his final solitude, Morrel’s mind is a storm of anguish. He is young enough to have years ahead, loved deeply by his wife and children, yet he believes he must remove himself from their lives to preserve their honor. His reasoning may be flawed, but to him it feels tragically inevitable. His face reflects this forced resignation, his eyes raised toward heaven as tears gather.

The seconds slip past. The pistols lie ready; he reaches for one, whispers his daughter’s name, then sets it down again to write a few final words — a farewell he fears he has not expressed fully enough. The clock continues its relentless march, and Morrel waits, counting the time not in minutes now, but in seconds, as the moment he has chosen draws near.

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Morrel tells Maximilian to leave him and keep Madame Morrel and Julie away. Maximilian, clinging to the faintest hope that seeing Julie again might change his father’s mind, asks whether Morrel will see his sister once more. Morrel refuses gently: he has already said his farewell that morning.

Maximilian then asks if his father has any final instructions. Morrel gives him one sacred command: the house of Thomson & French — the only firm that showed compassion in his ruin — must be repaid first when the family’s fortunes are rebuilt. Its agent, arriving within minutes to collect the impossible bill, must be treated with respect. Maximilian promises.

Morrel dismisses him a final time, telling him the will is in the bedroom secretaire and that he must leave him alone. Maximilian stands frozen, unable to move, until Morrel invokes the metaphor of a soldier ordered into certain death: honor demands obedience even when the outcome is fatal. Maximilian, weeping, embraces his father with desperate force and at last obeys, rushing from the room.

Once he is gone, Morrel remains motionless for a moment, staring at the door through which his son disappeared. Then, extending his hand with final resolve, he pulls the bell to summon Cocles — the next step in his preparations.

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Maximilian assures his father of his unwavering admiration, calling him the most honorable man he has ever known. Morrel, moved, tells him there is nothing more to say and instructs him to rejoin his mother and sister. Instead, Maximilian kneels and asks for his father’s blessing.

Morrel places his hands on his son’s head, kisses him repeatedly, and gives a solemn benediction — not only in his own name, but in the name of generations of honorable Morrels. He urges Maximilian to rebuild what misfortune has destroyed: to live frugally, work tirelessly, protect his mother and sister, and one day restore the family’s standing. He paints a future scene in which Maximilian, standing in the same office, can proudly declare that he has accomplished what his father could not — and that his father died peacefully because he trusted him to do so.

Maximilian cries out in anguish, begging to know why his father cannot live. Morrel explains with stark clarity: survival would mean dishonor. Living, he would be seen as a man who broke his word, failed his commitments, and brought ruin upon himself. Friends would avoid him; even his family would bear the shame of his bankruptcy. But if he dies, he dies as an “honest but unfortunate man,” and the city will mourn him. His death would preserve the family’s honor and allow Maximilian to walk proudly, free from the stigma Morrel believes would otherwise cling to them all.

The weight of this logic crushes Maximilian. He groans, grief-stricken, but submits to his father’s devastating resolve.

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Morrel silently directs Maximilian to read the ledger. The figures speak with a brutal clarity: the debt due at eleven o’clock, the almost nonexistent funds available, and the impossibility of meeting the obligation. When Maximilian asks whether every option has been exhausted, Morrel answers simply: yes. There is no money coming in, no resource left to call upon, no appeal still possible. In half an hour, their name — honored for generations — will be disgraced.

Maximilian declares the truth in a low voice: dishonor is imminent. Morrel replies with the old belief that blood washes out dishonor. Maximilian understands immediately. He reaches toward one of the pistols, accepting the grim solution, but Morrel stops him — reminding him of his mother and sister, who depend on him.

Maximilian freezes, shaken. To obey his father’s wish means accepting the agony of survival. Morrel tells him he is strong enough to bear it, commanding nothing but asking him to judge the situation as if it were his own. After a moment of heavy reflection, Maximilian removes the epaulets from his uniform — the symbols of honor and rank — and resigns himself to the burden placed upon him.

He takes his father’s hand and says with solemn resolve that his father may die in peace; he will live. The two embrace, both overwhelmed by grief, duty, and love. Morrel murmurs that none of this is his fault — a final attempt to shield his son from the cruelty of circumstances he could not control.

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While Julie rushes to carry out Sinbad’s mysterious instructions, Madame Morrel explains the full extent of their ruin to Maximilian. Though he knew the family had suffered financially, he had no idea how desperate the situation had become. The revelation leaves him stunned.

He runs upstairs to find his father, knocking at the study door with no response. Then he hears the bedroom door open behind him. Morrel emerges — startled to see his son, unaware he had arrived — and holding something hidden beneath his coat. Maximilian embraces him but recoils in horror when he feels the shape of pistols.

The worst fear becomes clear: Morrel has decided to end his life rather than face the disgrace of bankruptcy. Maximilian pleads with him, desperate to understand, and Morrel, moved by his son’s honor and anguish, agrees to explain.

He leads Maximilian into the study, sets the pistols on the desk, and shows him the open ledger: within thirty minutes, he must pay 287,500 francs. He has only 15,257. The numbers spell out the truth he believes is inescapable — ruin, dishonor, and a fate he cannot bear to survive.

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The postscript to Sinbad’s letter shakes Julie’s initial joy: she must go alone, and the porter will deny everything if she brings anyone else. Her innocence leaves her uncertain of the dangers such a mission might pose, yet the very unknown makes it more frightening.

Rather than consult her mother or brother, Julie instinctively turns to Emmanuel, confiding everything — the earlier visit from Thomson & French’s agent, the promise she made, the mysterious messenger on the stairs, and finally the letter itself. Emmanuel reads it and tells her she must go.

Julie hesitates: the letter forbids companionship. Emmanuel assures her she will appear alone — he will wait nearby at the corner of the Rue du Musée, out of sight, ready to come to her aid if she is delayed or endangered.

When Julie asks whether he truly believes she should obey the instructions, Emmanuel answers yes. The messenger had said her father’s safety depended on it. Pressed further, Emmanuel explains the grim truth: this very morning, September 5th, Morrel must pay nearly 300,000 francs. The household possesses not even 15,000. Without a miracle before eleven o’clock, Morrel will be forced to declare bankruptcy — an act he believes worse than death.

Realizing the stakes, Julie no longer hesitates. She rushes out with Emmanuel, determined to fulfill her oath and carry out Sinbad’s urgent command.

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Julie obeys her father’s unusually firm request to remain with her mother, staying motionless in the room despite her anxiety. Moments later the door opens, and she is swept into the arms of her brother, Maximilian, whose sudden arrival brings an outburst of joy and relief. Madame Morrel embraces her son, and Maximilian immediately senses the gravity of the situation from the fear reflected in their faces.

At his mother’s request, Julie hurries out to tell her father of Maximilian’s arrival. But on the staircase she encounters a stranger holding a letter. Speaking with a strong Italian accent, he asks if she is Julie Morrel and hands her a message, insisting it concerns her father’s best interests.

The letter is from “Sinbad the Sailor.” Its instructions are precise and urgent: she must go at once to No. 15, Allées de Meilhan; obtain the key to a fifth-floor room; retrieve a red silk purse from the mantel; and deliver it to her father before eleven o’clock. She is reminded that she once swore to obey implicitly — and that she must undertake this mission alone, for if anyone accompanies her, the porter will deny all knowledge.

The messenger vanishes before she can question him. Holding the letter, Julie realizes this mysterious intervention may be the only hope left to save her father.

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Morrel maintains an outward calm in the days leading to September 5th, going about his routine as though nothing has changed. Yet his actions betray the truth: he holds Julie close for an unusually long time after dinner, and she later confides to her mother that his heart was beating violently despite his composed demeanor.

On September 4th, he asks Julie for the key to his study — a request that terrifies her. The key has always been hers to keep, and he has never asked for it except as a childhood punishment. Sensing danger, she delays and immediately consults Emmanuel, who urges her not to give up the key and to stay by her father’s side as much as possible the next day.

That night, Madame Morrel listens in agony as her husband paces restlessly until three in the morning before collapsing onto the bed. Mother and daughter pass the night together in dread, waiting for Maximilian’s arrival.

At eight the next morning, Morrel enters their room. He is calm, even tender — but his pallor and exhausted features reveal the turmoil of the night. He shows Julie and her mother an unusual level of affection, kissing Julie repeatedly and gazing at her with sorrowful intensity. When Julie attempts to follow him, remembering Emmanuel’s warning, Morrel gently stops her: she must remain with her mother. His tone leaves no room for refusal.

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Though Morrel’s financial situation is now undeniably hopeless, he descends to dinner with an unnerving calm. To his wife and daughter, this composure feels far more frightening than despair would have been. Breaking his usual habit of spending the evening at the Phocéens club, Morrel instead withdraws directly to his office, isolating himself.

Cocles, deeply shaken by what he has learned, wanders the courtyard in a daze, sitting bareheaded in the blazing sun. Emmanuel attempts to comfort the women, but he knows the business too well to offer convincing reassurance; catastrophe is imminent.

As night falls, Madame Morrel and Julie wait anxiously for Morrel to seek them out, but instead they hear him pass quietly down the hall and lock himself inside his room. Unable to bear the uncertainty, both mother and daughter independently approach his door to watch through the keyhole.

They find him writing. Julie notes only this, but Madame Morrel sees what her daughter did not: he is writing on stamped paper. In an instant, she understands — this is not routine correspondence but a final document. The realization that her husband is preparing his will strikes her with silent terror.

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