which meant a great deal. Then within a year he passed away and named Murshida Rabia Martin as his successor and we received our study papers and went on as a small group. She would come every year and visit all the groups in different cities. In Detroit I led study groups under Murshida Martin, using a course of study outlined by Inayat Khan for the western world and western minds. But you know how it was in those days. Nothing grew, everything kind of stood still. There would be a few, one or two would come in the evening. We held the very beautiful universal worship service, not compulsory, only for those who like a service.

After twenty years, when Murshida Martin passed away -- that was the hardest thing for me. I just felt I was left alone, standing alone, no place to go, no way possible to go on . . . I thought there is nothing ahead. I can't stand still and I don't want to go back. Then I thought I wanted very much . . . had a great need for a high spiritual Master. I was very, very distressed and didn't know what to do.

I had heard of Meher Baba from different ones. In fact, Murshida Martin had written me -- not mentioning his name -- of a high spiritual Master who was the head of the Indian hierarchy and who would be coming to this country sometime. And that I would meet him then. I didn't pay any attention to it. I thought, "I'm a Sufi and need a Sufi Master." I knew a number of people who followed Baba — some of my friends in San Francisco, such as Samuel Lewis, who told me about him. I thought that he was not my master. And then Samuel Lewis asked me to write to Murshida Duce, that she would like for me to write her. I wrote to her and she later came to Detroit and stayed with me for a few days and brought some slides of Baba and I arranged for a little lecture room where she gave a talk and showed the slides. She asked me to send for the book Avatar. Finally I got it and read it and thought, "Well, no doubt he's a great man, a great master . . . But I need a Sufi master. He's not a Sufi master." But I didn't doubt him or anything that he said he was.

So it went on and on until finally I became so desperately in need of something, someone, that it came to me: If there is a master living in the world today, I've got to meet him. And from then on I was in correspondence with Ivy Duce. In the meantime, I had met Norina Matchabelli when Ivy Duce had invited me to stay at her home in New York for a few days -- this was about 1948 or 1949.

Each one that came to Baba had to write him a letter, which I did. However, I cannot remember one word, not one word that was in that letter! In his reply he said: "I am now in the New Life and I cannot answer your question." And I don't remember what the question was . . . Norina and I kept up a correspondence and she told me that Baba was to come to this country. We bought our property in Myrtle Beach in 1950 and we would come down from time to time. Norina would always ask me for tea and she would tell me about Baba: "Baba says to love Him more and more and to love Him more and more . . . Baba always told us that."

It is very interesting how we happened to buy property in Myrtle Beach. We were going to Florida and I had written and told Ivy Duce that we were going there, and she suggested we stop in Myrtle Beach and meet Mrs. Patterson. I asked my husband as we were making plans to return from Florida if he thought we should stop in Myrtle Beach on our way home. So we did and phoned Elizabeth when we arrived. Elizabeth and Norina took us out to dinner and we had a really nice visit. The next day Elizabeth took me to the Center. Then we went over to the yacht basin. My husband was over there with Mr. Ellsworth, who was the manager of Briarcliff Acres. Ivy had said that she had property in Briarcliff Acres and for me to look at her property. I asked Mr. Ellsworth if he would show me her property, which he did and I commented, "Oh, Mr. Ellsworth, this is such a beautiful place. Do you have any more lots for sale?" He replied, "Well, yes as a matter of fact, I do have a couple of lots here." And so he brought us down to the end of the road and he said there are two lots here. I asked him how long would he give us to make up our minds since "we have to go home and think it over." He said, "Oh no, I can't give