"If I let you sing here in Italian, will you sign it?"
"Here—in Berlin—sing in Italian?" I gasped.
"It will be a novelty," replied Count von Hochberg. "But the people here want one. You are very much of a novelty, quite different from the stout ladies who waddle about protesting their operatic fate to spectators who find it difficult to believe in their cruel lot and youthful innocence. In you I have discovered a happy combination of voice, figure, personality, and—eyes." He was something of a cavalier, that nice Count von Hochberg, as you will see. "To secure you for my patrons I will let you sing in Italian."
What could I say? It was the greatest compliment yet paid me. I glanced around the Opernhaus, hesitating. Then—I consented. The legal contract for three years was signed by my mother and father for me, as I was still under age. It was agreed that I was to sing "Faust," "Traviata," and "Pagliacci," three rôles, in Italian, but I was not to be required to sing in German until I should perfect myself in the language.
Then ensued a spring and summer of great preparations, for my contract did not begin until the following autumn. We went to Lake Constance, Switzerland, to study with Graziani. I was as thin as a young girl could well afford to be, yet I worked to the full limit of my strength, for I realized that my wonderful opportunity had at last arrived. I literally floated on air that summer.
Then, too, I had planned a surprise that would especially please the women: the matter of dress. There lives in Paris an artist to her finger-tips in the matter of creating stage frocks, and that wonderful woman has made every costume from head to feet that I have ever put on in the theater. She had already "combined me" such lovely things as made my heart thrill to appear in them!
The night of October 15, 1901, was my début at the Royal Opera, Berlin. There was no advance notice, no presswork. The bill bore the usual three asterisks in this wise, as I was a "guest" and not a member of the company:—
MARGUERITE. . . . . . . . . . . ⁂
At the bottom of the programme, in small type, the three asterisks were repeated, and the line:—