Jackie and Maria

by Gill Paul

  “What do you suggest?” Maria asked, sipping a glass of Bollinger. She was scared of losing Ari to the president’s scrawny sister-in-law, so Maggie’s reassurance was very welcome.

  Maggie’s eyes twinkled. “We both know that Ari enjoys conquest: signing a new deal, outsmarting business rivals, or getting a prestigious new guest on board the Christina. With you, perhaps he feels he has already pulled off the deal and there is no challenge left. Do you catch my drift?”

  “Ye-es,” Maria answered, unsure of where this was heading.

  “So perhaps you should drop a hint that the deal is not impregnable.” She lifted her glass and clinked it against Maria’s. “Then you are a challenge again.”

  Maria was baffled. “A hint? You mean like him finding an item of men’s swimwear in my cabin?”

  “No. Much more subtle.” She looked around the grand dining room, decorated with curling art nouveau tendrils painted on glass panels. “Have dinner with a gentleman friend. Someone young and handsome, whom Ari will not recognize. Come here, or to another prominent restaurant. Let me know the evening it will happen and I will mention it to a photographer friend and—lo and behold—Ari will get a shock when he peruses his morning papers. You and I know he can’t resist the society pages.”

  Maria wasn’t sure. “Isn’t that a dangerous game? I don’t want to encourage tit-for-tat infidelities.”

  “Of course not.” Maggie shook her head slowly. “Your dinner will be completely innocent. And when he telephones—as he surely will—you can assure him of that. But for a short while he will be worried, and it will focus his mind. I know you would never be capable of infidelity, but he doesn’t know that. Lotharios make the most suspicious lovers, because they judge everyone by their own standards.”

  “Is he a lothario?” Maria felt exhausted at the thought. She knew there had been affairs during his marriage to Tina but had expected them to stop once he was with her. How naive she had been.

  “He is not the worst. But make him woo you. Be a little mysterious. Don’t always rush for the phone when he calls. You two will be fine. I can feel it in my gambler’s bones.” She finished her champagne and signaled for a waiter to bring two more glasses. “To love!” she toasted.

  “To love,” Maria echoed.

  MARIA WASTED NO time in inviting Zeffirelli for dinner at Maxim’s. He was roughly her age, with Italian good looks—a high brow, winning smile, year-round tan, and elegant clothes. There was no flirtation in their relationship, but they shared many interests and had an amusing evening. When she spotted Maggie’s photographer friend wielding his camera, Maria leaned in close, as if keen not to miss a word that her companion was uttering.

  A photograph appeared in Paris Match the following morning, along with a caption mentioning that Maria Callas had dined with a “mystery escort.” Maggie called, laughing her pretty trill of a laugh.

  “Darling, when I suggested you ask a man for dinner, I meant one who likes women!”

  Maria was puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  “Zeffirelli is a homosexual.”

  “Really? I had no idea.” Maria giggled. “I wondered why he didn’t mention a wife or girlfriend. I must be very slow on the uptake.”

  There were dozens of homosexual men in the world of opera. Sodomy was illegal in many countries, so few men openly broadcast their preferences, but word got around. Sometimes it was widely known, but at other times, such as this, she was one of the last to find out.

  Ari called a couple of hours later, and she greeted him cheerfully. “Hello, darling. How are your famous guests?”

  He got straight to the point. “Who did you have dinner with last night and why is your picture in the newspaper?”

  “Is it?” Maria asked, disingenuous. “I can’t think why. Zeffirelli and I had a meal yesterday to talk about our Tosca.”

  “Did he try to seduce you?”

  Maria paused, as if considering the question. “He was very sweet but I don’t think he meant to seduce me. Perhaps . . .” She let her voice trail off, teasing.

  “Perhaps what?” he barked.

  “Oh, nothing. I am sure it was innocent.”

  “You don’t understand men,” he told her. “You have only known Battista and me. You don’t realize the way men think.”

  Maria didn’t mention that she had spent her working life in the company of men and had learned how to rebuff those who behaved inappropriately. “I’m sure his intentions were honorable,” she replied. “Don’t give it a second thought.”

  Before Ari hung up, he asked about her itinerary for the next few days. She told him she was flying to London to try to persuade the management at Covent Garden that her Tosca should be staged as soon as possible. She loved Zeffirelli’s ideas and wanted to strike while the iron was hot. Ari demanded to know where she would be staying, whom she planned to see, and what day she would arrive back in Paris. She gave him the information, chuckling to herself. Maggie was a genius. She must ask her advice more often.

  WHILE IN LONDON Maria caught up with several old friends, and she took the opportunity to ask more about Lee Radziwill. She learned that as well as their London town house at 4 Buckingham Place, the Radziwills owned a country house called Turville Grange outside Henley-on-Thames. She learned that Lee had been on the previous year’s best-dressed list and was friends with a number of Paris designers, who gave her the first pick of their collections. And she was told that Lee’s adoption of the title Princess was considered rather outré in London society. She and Stas should have asked permission of the reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, to use their royal titles; such permission had not been sought, so legally they were just Mr. and Mrs. Radziwill.

  Maria knew that both had been married previously, and she asked how they had obtained their divorces and still managed to have their union blessed by the Catholic Church. This was a question close to her own heart. The answer came that Mrs. Kennedy had personally intervened at the Vatican to help Lee get an annulment of her first marriage, thus making the second acceptable to the Church. Was that ethical? Maria wondered. Didn’t presidents’ wives have better things to do with their time?

  She didn’t know what she would do with the information she collected, but it felt important that she understand her enemy. And she was under no illusion: Lee was most definitely an enemy.

  Chapter 38

  The Greek Islands

  October 1963

  The Christina sailed to a new Greek island each day. After breakfast, anyone who wished to could take the launch ashore to wander around seaside villages, shop for souvenirs, or stroll along the beach. Jackie made sure to stand near Lee or Sue Roosevelt rather than any of the men, so that if she was photographed there could be no adverse media coverage. Usually there was a group of passengers on these excursions, but one day Jackie and Lee were the only two to disembark, and, after they had poked around the only two shops in the village, Jackie suggested they have an early lunch at a beachfront taverna.

  They ordered glasses of retsina and Greek salads and began chatting about their fellow guests.

  “I love the silk palazzo pajamas Princess Irene Galitzine wears,” Jackie said. “I must get a pair. They look so stylish.” The princess was a fashion designer who catered to the European aristocracy.

  “I’ve got loads of them,” Lee said. “She brought them out in 1960. I guess they haven’t reached America yet—although I’m sure I’ve seen Audrey Hepburn in a pair.”

  Jackie took a sip of retsina, remembering that Jack used to date the actress—but that was a long time ago. “What do you make of Aristotle?” she asked. “He’s hospitable but I find it hard to get a sense of the real man.” She noticed that Lee’s cheeks flushed slightly at her words. Her sister began fiddling with her napkin as she answered.

  “He’s a generous host . . . still, I suppose he can afford to be.” She looked up. “What is it? Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “You like him, don’t y
ou?” Jackie took a cigarette from her pack and offered Lee one, then sparked her lighter. “Are the rumors true?”

  “What rumors?” Lee asked, sucking in smoke as if it had been days since her last cigarette, not just half an hour.

  “The Washington Post hinted that a certain Greek tycoon might be hoping to become the brother-in-law of the American president.” Jackie smiled, encouraging disclosure. “Go on, tell all.”

  “Who wouldn’t want to marry him?” Lee shrugged. “All that money is hugely erotic.”

  “But you’re married already. And you love Stas!” Jackie tried to hide her annoyance. It was hard, but if she remonstrated with her sister she knew that Lee would clam up.

  “Stas and I haven’t had sex since Tina was born.” She flicked ash to the ground and took another drag, exhaling slowly. “I love him but I’m not attracted to him anymore.”

  “Oh, for crying out loud!” Jackie clattered her glass on the table, losing patience. “You can’t change husbands every time desire fades a bit. After giving birth, sex is the last thing you feel like but it will come back, I promise.”

  Lee wrinkled her nose. “Keep your hair on. It’s not as if we’re getting divorced or anything.”

  “I should hope not,” Jackie rebuked, “because I certainly won’t pull strings to get you an annulment next time.” She bit her tongue. This wasn’t how she had meant to broach the subject. “So tell me . . . what’s Aristotle like in bed?”

  “Surprisingly talented,” Lee admitted with a coy expression. “You’d be amazed.”

  Jackie sat openmouthed. “So it’s true! You are sleeping with him.” She leaned back in her chair to regard her younger sister. “Isn’t he hairy as a gorilla?”

  “Not like a gorilla. The hair is very silky and fine. And he has the most beautiful smell.” Her tone was soft. It sounded as if she was smitten.

  “What about Maria Callas?” Jackie asked. “He’s still with her.”

  Lee’s expression darkened. “Wasn’t it a Greek who said ‘All’s fair in love and war’?”

  “No, it was the English writer John Lyly,” Jackie replied tartly. Fidelity clearly wasn’t part of Lee’s moral code. This was the woman who might have slept with Jack and who was being unfaithful to Stas, so why would she worry about Ari’s long-term mistress? “Does Stas know?”

  “We haven’t discussed it,” Lee said. “But he has affairs too.” She tilted her head girlishly. “Are you cross with me? Please don’t be cross.”

  Jackie stubbed out her cigarette in a glass ashtray. The breeze instantly picked it up and blew it to the sandy floor. “I need you to promise that if you get divorced, and you and Aristotle decide to make it official, you wait till after November next year so it doesn’t interfere with Jack’s reelection chances. And in the meantime, you keep it out of the papers. Can you do that?”

  Lee shrugged. “It’s not just up to me.”

  “Shall I make Aristotle promise as well?” Jackie asked, pushing away her untouched salad.

  “No!” Lee reacted quickly. “Don’t say anything to him. I’ll have a word.”

  ONE BALMY EVENING, as they sat out on deck, Sue Roosevelt asked Jackie about Patrick. She shook her head. She couldn’t talk about him. Another time, Aristotle expressed his condolences, and she thanked him and said she was feeling much better for being on the cruise.

  It was only with Jack that she told the truth. Every night, she wrote him a letter, telling him what they had done during the day, telling him how much she missed him, and telling him that she carried Patrick in her heart wherever she went.

  The letters grew more romantic as the days went by. “It is too long to be away from you,” she wrote halfway through the vacation. “I wish you could have come with me, to relax without any pressure, but I know that’s impossible.

  Do you ever look backwards to the coincidences that brought us together? Meeting on the train—then that funny old evening at the Bartletts’? Isn’t it strange that I had been looking for you all my life, then I didn’t recognize you when I found you? Not straightaway, at any rate. I wonder how long it was before you knew I was the one. A while, if I remember correctly. Thank God we did—before it was too late.

  We’ve had our share of sadnesses—more than our share—and you know I haven’t been crazy about life in the political zoo, but if I could have my time over, whether in this lifetime or another, I would always choose you.

  Your loving Jacqueline

  Every morning she handed her letter to the maid who brought her breakfast, and by the time she appeared on deck it had been dispatched by Onassis’s staff.

  Jackie flew back to New York on October 17, then transferred for the short flight to D.C., expecting that there would be a driver waiting to take her to the White House. Instead, as she arrived at Washington National Airport, there were Jack and the children, holding a banner that read WELCOME HOME, MOMMY. She ran into Jack’s arms, not caring who was watching. His face was puffy, a side effect of the steroids he took for his Addison’s disease, and he looked more tired than she had ever seen him.

  “I’ll never leave you again,” she whispered before turning to hug the children, who were tugging on her coat and squealing for her attention.

  Chapter 39

  Paris

  October 20, 1963

  Ari arrived at Maria’s Paris apartment on October 20, while she was still asleep. She awoke with a start to find him sitting on the edge of the bed, watching her. Bruna must have let him in. Without saying a word, he pulled a jewelry box from his coat pocket and placed it in the palm of her hand, wrapping her fingers around it.

  Maria opened the box and saw a pair of earrings, but the light was too gloomy with the shutters drawn to make out any detail. She switched on her bedside lamp and found that they were drop style, with pinkish, pear-shaped rubies set in stems of diamonds. Art deco, if she wasn’t mistaken. Ari knew she loved deco. They were beautiful, but to her the gift smacked of a guilty conscience. She closed the box and put it on the bedside table.

  “Thank you,” she said, without smiling.

  He leaned in to kiss her on the lips, tentatively. She didn’t turn her head away but didn’t reciprocate either.

  “Your guests have gone, I assume?” she asked.

  “They have. I think Mrs. Kennedy enjoyed her holiday,” he said. “At first she only wanted to swim, read books, and sleep, but by the last few days she seemed relaxed.”

  Maria nodded. “And Lee? Was she relaxed too?”

  She watched him closely, but his eyes looked sincere as he replied: “I think so, but I didn’t spend any time alone with her—with either of them.”

  Maria nodded, a lump in her throat. She’d had to ask.

  “I need your help,” he told her, lifting her hand and linking his fingers through hers. “I’m having an architect draw up plans for the building work on Skorpios. I’m dredging a harbor for Christina, building roads, and importing sand for a beach, but the main villa and guest cottages need a woman’s touch. I want you to look at the ideas. Will you help?”

  Maria closed her eyes. She would love for them to build a home together, to create a cozy nest. Although she was mistress of the Christina when she was on board, it wasn’t hers and never would be. But before she agreed, there was another matter that had been preying on her mind.

  “I would be happy to help, but there is something I want from you in return.” She took a deep breath. “I am going to be forty in December, and I want us to be married by then. I don’t care what form of ceremony, but forty is too old for a woman to remain unwed.”

  He looked startled. “But the Church won’t recognize it.”

  “That is less important to me than you making an announcement to the world that I am your wife.” She tried to read his expression, but his face wasn’t giving much away.

  “Is this about Lee?” he asked. “Because you have no reason to be jealous of her.”

  “Not just Lee; there will be other wom
en who come creeping around, trying to win your affections. I don’t want to be just another of your conquests. You say I am the most important person in your life; you say you have never loved anyone as much as me. Now is the time to prove it.”

  Ari rose and walked to the window, drawing back a shutter to look out at the gray, overcast sky and the rain-soaked street below. “When the time is right we will marry, I promise. Until then, can’t we simply enjoy each other? You are the only woman who truly knows me. You’re my great love, my best friend. Why change all that?”

  “It’s a question of respect, Ari. I don’t want to be your mistress anymore.” She had been giving it a lot of thought. A ring on her finger might not stop him from being unfaithful, but it would make him think twice about leaving her for another woman. “Your divorce from Tina was finalized long ago, so you’re a free agent. What will it take for ‘the time’ to be ‘right,’ as far as you’re concerned?”

  He crossed his arms, leaning against the wall. “Under Italian law, you are still married to Battista.”

  “What does that matter? Neither of us lives in Italy.” She silently cursed her ex-husband.

  Ari continued: “More to the point, I always hoped Alexander would come to accept you, but he remains as prickly as ever. He would hate us getting married and I don’t want to upset him at such a difficult age.”

  Maria tutted. “Is that your strongest argument? We can’t have our happiness dictated by a fifteen-year-old. He would accept our marriage in the end.” She paused, then said something that was very hard for her. “If Omero had lived, I know you would have married me. Have you changed your mind because it doesn’t look as though I am capable of bearing you a child?”

  “Of course not,” he said with feeling. “I am sad for your sake, but it doesn’t change my wariness about marriage.”

  Maria closed her eyes to stop the tears from coming. She had recently agreed with her fertility doctor that there was no point in continuing the hormone treatments. It seemed her womb was what he termed “inhospitable”; eggs were being fertilized but not implanting. Every monthly bleed could mean another little death. Every month she mourned for the child that she hadn’t been able to bring into being.