Erelong a crisis appeared to take place; the doctors held out hopes: the patient might recover his health, they said.[61] Calvin's thoughts and desires were turned once more towards Orleans; he would have wished to go there instantly,[62] but duty was still the strongest, and he resolved to wait until his father's convalescence was complete. Thus one day after another glided away.[63] Alas! the doctors were deceived. 'There is no longer any hope of a cure,' they soon told him; 'your father's death cannot be far off.'[64] Calvin, therefore, determined (14th of May, 1528) to write to Duchemin, which he had not yet done since his departure. It is the first of the reformer's letters that has been handed down to us. 'You know,' he says, 'that I am very exact in my correspondence, and that I carry it even to importunity.[65] You will be astonished, perhaps, that I have been wanting in my extreme punctuality; but when you know the cause, you will restore to me your friendship, should I perchance have forfeited it.' He then tells Duchemin of his father's condition, and adds: 'Happen what may, I will see you again.'[66] What did happen is not very clear. Calvin was at Noyon, as we have seen, on the 14th of May, 1528; perhaps he remained all the summer with the sick man. It has been concluded from this letter to Duchemin that Gerard Calvin died shortly after the 14th of May; at that time _the approach of death_ was certain, according to the doctors; but doctors may be mistaken. According to Theodore Beza, he died during his son's residence at Bourges, nine or ten months later, and a passage from Calvin, which we shall quote further on, confirms Beza's testimony, of itself so decisive.