On February 24, 1815, the merchant vessel Pharaon arrives at Marseille from Smyrna, her captain dead of fever on the voyage. The ship's first mate, nineteen-year-old Edmond Dantès, has brought her home. That evening, at his betrothal feast with Mercédès, gendarmes arrive and arrest Dantès on charges of carrying a letter for the Bonapartist cause — a letter planted by his jealous shipmate Danglars. He is taken to the Château d'If, where he will remain for fourteen years.