little silver locket for which I had paid two dollars in Melrose when I
was a schoolgirl. At that time my cash allowance for pin money was
twenty-five cents a week. One day I saw this locket in a jewelry store
window. I said nothing, but saved enough to buy the simple trinket,
which I wore as a talisman, with Nordica's picture in it. Naturally,
therefore, I wore this in the hope that it would bring me luck in my
search for her, and soon to my joy I saw the famous singer approaching
in her open carriage, with Mr. Doeme. Of course, she did not recognize
me, but as she drove by I stood up and threw the precious locket into
her lap to attract her attention.

Mr. Doeme picked it up, and to Nordica's amazement she recognized her own
picture. While her carriage turned around, I waited on the path, and
soon my idol was actually allowing me to talk with her and renewing
once more the interest she had shown while I was in New York.

She invited me to come and sing for her in her beautiful home in the
Bois, and, when we parted, she handed back my precious talisman. "Don't
throw it away again," she said with a smile.

"But it has brought me such good luck!" I replied happily.

Next day, and many times thereafter, I visited Madame Nordica, and both
she and Mr. Doeme were genuinely interested in my vocal welfare. The
question of my future was discussed, and, contrary to the idea I had of
going to Italy and following the usual procedure of enlisting in a
provincial theater there for experience, Mr. Doeme suggested my studying
with a Russian-Italian, Graziani, in Berlin, whose book upon vocal study
he had recently received and found unusual and beneficial.

I was not at all keen upon abandoning Italy for Germany, but Madame
Nordica's advice was paramount, and, armed with some nice letters from
her to various friends whom she had learned to know during her triumphs
in Bayreuth, we made plans to break up our Paris home.

CHAPTER VII

GERMANY: THE TURNING-POINT

I spent that summer of 1900 uneventfully in Brittany, and in the early
autumn off we started for Berlin.

This was another turning-point in my career. The German capital was to
further as dazzling a future as my heart could have dreamed--and with it
were to come Romance, Fame and Wealth under the shadow of the Prussian
eagle's wing.

One of my letters from Nordica was to Frau von Rath, the charming wife
of Herr Adolph von Rath, the leading banker of Berlin. Fr