He waved my protest away with his hands. “No, I will tell you. I want that you should know.”

And then he began to talk, telling his story in a low voice, glancing around constantly and suspiciously for passersby.

The second time that he saw Amelita Galli-Curci was in November of 1921, he told me, when she made her debut with the Metropolitan Opera Company of New York, singing Violette in Giuseppe Verdi’s La Traviata. It had been three years and ten months since the voice of her music had changed his life, but Avrum had not forgotten her.

As Amelita Galli-Curci was being lifted to celebrity in the theaters of America by the strong hands of applause, Avrum was committing the only deliberate crime of his life. He was carefully, patiently, inspecting pelts of silver fox and sable and mink and all the other exotic animals that were shipped to Mendenhal’s Fur, Ltd., where he worked. He was searching for perfection, and when he found it—a fisher—he tucked it under his heavy coat and took it from the company. Working in the small apartment where he lived, he fashioned it into a boa of exquisite beauty.

On the day following her debut in La Traviata, a performance that had made him weep unashamedly in the audience, Avrum appeared at the hotel where Amelita Galli-Curci was staying. He announced at the desk that he was delivering a gift to Madame Galli-Curci from a benefactor of the Metropolitan who wished to remain anonymous. Avrum insisted the benefactor had instructed him to present the boa personally.

He was led to her suite by the hotel manager. When she opened the door and he was introduced, Avrum bowed graciously as he had rehearsed hundreds of times before his mirror, holding the boa draped across his extended arms.

“Madame Galli-Curci,” he said in a whisper.

When she saw the boa, she gasped audibly. She stroked it with her fingertips as Avrum held it, then she took it from him and lifted it to her face and held it tenderly, as a lover would hold a lover.

“Who made such a beautiful thing?” she asked.

“I am a furrier,” Avrum confessed humbly. “It was I.” He added, “On the instruction of your admirer.”

“Then you are a man of great talent,” Amelita Galli-Curci told him. “I must give you something in return. Tickets to a performance, perhaps.”

“Thank you. You are most kind,” Avrum answered, “but I have tickets, as always when you sing. Yet, there are two small things I would accept and treasure if you have them to offer.”

“Please tell me,” Amelita Galli-Curic said.

“A sheet of music—any music—with your name on it, and, if possible, a small trinket you might have worn in one of your performances.”