But the tone of that interview was surprisingly not bitter. Though Gencic expressed regret that she had lost touch with Djokovic at that stage and expressed resentment toward Srdjan for not keeping her better informed, she remembered the eight years they did spend in each other’s frequent company with great tenderness.

“Oh, special boy, that boy was unbelievable,” she said. “Very intelligent. He knew very well what to do, how much to do. He listens, and every word it was, ‘Please tell me again.’ And I’d say, ‘Did you understand me?’ And he would say, ‘Yes, but please, tell me again.’ He wanted to be so sure.”

Gencic met him when he was 6 while she was giving a summer clinic on the hardcourts across from his parents’ restaurant in Kopaonik, in the Serbian mountains near Montenegro. She had advised Monica Seles and Goran Ivanisevic in their junior years and knew — no, sensed — exceptional talent and determination when it was in front of her. She soon told the Djokovics — neither of whom played tennis seriously — that they had “a golden child.”

But her mentoring was not restricted to match tactics and coaxing Djokovic away from the one-handed backhand used by his idol Pete Sampras to the two-handed backhand that would later help make him No. 1.

“I gave him books, not books for young boys, books for older, about life, not just tennis,” she said. “We listened to music, and he liked to listen. I liked classical music, and he listened with me.”

Gencic said she explained that one particular piece was like a tennis match: “You start slowly and then stronger, stronger, stronger,” she said.

Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” left a particularly deep impact. “I could see he thought it was wonderful,” Gencic said. “And I explained to him, ‘When you play a match, Novak, and this is very important, when you play a match and suddenly you feel not very good, remember this music, remember how much adrenaline you have in your stomach and your body. Let this music push you to play stronger and stronger.’