by Gill Paul
“How are you?” he asked, his tone gentle.
“I’m well.” She felt unsteady on her feet and sat down on the chair in the hall. “Very busy. I’m giving a series of master classes next year for students at the Juilliard School in New York.” She was proud to have been invited. It would be fun to work with a new generation of opera singers, and she told Ari about her preparations, chattering to hide her nervousness.
“They are very lucky students!” he said. “And are you performing any concerts?”
“I don’t know. There seems to be enthusiasm for the idea of me singing onstage again. I guess people want to come along and be reminded of how great I used to be.”
“You’re selling yourself short,” he said.
She chuckled before she replied. “Even your metaphors involve money.”
He paused. “That’s the Maria I miss; the one who is straight with me, who tells it like it is.”
She didn’t answer, scared of where this conversation was heading. She was still too fragile to deal with him, like a smashed porcelain vase that had been hastily glued back together.
“Can I see you, Maria? Please?”
She shook her head firmly. “No.”
“What, never?”
“I can’t be your lover anymore. It harms me too much. And I don’t think I could see you without wanting to be your lover.”
She heard him sniff. Was he upset? She listened hard.
“Not even if I come to you waving the decree nisi and an engagement ring?” His voice was emotional.
“I can’t wait for that to happen. I need to protect myself, Ari.” There was no artifice now; only the truth.
“I understand,” he said at last. “But can I telephone sometimes? I can’t bear not being a part of your life. There’s no one else I trust the way I trust you. We have so much shared history. We can’t throw it all away.”
Maria considered. Her friends’ voices rang in her ears like a Greek chorus: “Have nothing to do with him.” “He’s arrogant and thinks only of himself.” “He manipulates you and poisons any chance of happiness.”
And then she thought about the closeness they had once shared. Could they be friends who spoke on the telephone? Or would it be a slippery slope that would lead to becoming lovers again?
“We can try,” she said. “But if you upset me, I will stop taking your calls. And I never want to hear you mention Mrs. Kennedy. Is that clear?”
“Of course. As you wish.” He paused, then spoke so tenderly it brought tears to her eyes: “I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”
IT WASN’T LONG before Maria and Ari fell back into their old habit of chatting on the phone most days. She looked forward to their conversations, enjoyed being part of his life again. He called for advice when his daughter, Christina, married a real-estate agent twenty-seven years her senior, who had four children from a previous marriage. He called with mounting alarm as Project Omega began to slip inexorably from his grasp. He called in fury and disbelief when Tina, his first wife, married his archrival Niarchos. To him it was the ultimate stab in the back, and Maria had to work hard to dissuade him when he threatened to send a hit man to murder Niarchos. But she would not, could not, see him.
“Why has my luck run out?” he asked in exasperation. “It’s as if the gods have turned against me.”
Maria thought to herself that the gods had turned against him when he entered into matrimony for vanity rather than love, but out loud she said, “Since when have you believed in luck? You and I make our own luck. It’s one of the things we have in common.”
She had begun touring with a tenor named Giuseppe di Stefano, singing medleys of arias and duets to sellout crowds across Europe. That was gratifying, even if she knew her audiences were not hearing the vocals that La Callas had once been capable of. “Watch out for di Stefano,” Ari warned her gruffly. “I hear he has a reputation as a ladies’ man.”
“He’s married!” Maria exclaimed, well aware of the irony. In fact, she had begun to sleep with her costar occasionally while on tour. It satisfied her physical needs, but her heart was not in it, and she was anxious that word did not reach the press and, in particular, Ari.
When asked in interviews about her relationship with him now, she told the truth: “He is my best friend. He is, was, and always will be.”
Chapter 70
Skorpios
Summer 1970
Jackie was delighted when Lee agreed to bring her children for a three-week vacation on Skorpios. She hoped it would give them a chance to clear the air and become close again, and that Lee and Ari would settle into a comfortable new relationship as brother- and sister-in-law. Whatever the truth about their affair—and each had different versions—it was time to relegate it to the past.
Jackie had assumed that Stas would be coming too and allocated them the largest guest cottage, which she filled with fresh flowers. But when the jeep drove up from the jetty at six in the evening, only Lee and her children stepped out.
Jackie rushed to kiss her in greeting. “Where’s Stas?” she asked.
“I couldn’t bear to bring him. He’s so boring, he would have spoiled our fun.”
Jackie glanced at the children, who were shuffling their feet in embarrassment. “Maybe he can join us later. Leave your bags for the staff and come have a drink. You’re just in time for cocktail hour.”
Caroline and John took Anthony and Tina to explore the island. They were close in age and more like siblings than cousins. Ari joined the sisters on the terrace, kissing Lee’s hand with a chivalrous bow.
“Princess!” he said. “Welcome to Skorpios.”
Watching them, Jackie couldn’t detect any sign of their former intimacy. They seemed for all the world like old friends.
Lee ordered a vodka on the rocks, and when it arrived she gulped it down. “The journey made me thirsty. Can I have another?”
“Of course!” Ari signaled to a waiter.
“I’ve brought the plans for the villa I’m going to build,” Lee told him. “You’ll love them.”
“What villa?” Jackie asked, wondering where Stas had gotten the money. He did well as a property developer, but he usually needed the profits from his last build to invest in the next.
“Just outside Athens,” Lee told her. “Ari gave me a plot of land—a very generous one. Didn’t he mention it to you?”
Jackie glanced at Ari, but his face was impassive. “When was that?”
“At your wedding,” Lee said, looking smug. “It was my wedding present from him.”
“How kind!” Jackie mumbled, thinking it was odd that neither of them had mentioned it. She wondered what other secrets they might have been keeping from her.
Lee drank red wine all the way through dinner, then returned to vodka, and by the time they retired to the terrace for a nightcap, she was thoroughly blitzed. The alcohol made her conversation dull and monotonous, although she clearly thought she was being hilarious as she described parties she had been to and celebrities she’d met.
“Did I tell you Andy Warhol took me backstage after the Rolling Stones concert in Madison Square Garden? They are such a scream!”
She launched into a lengthy anecdote about how one of the Stones wanted her to go to his hotel room, but he kept calling her Princess Radish and she told him she couldn’t possibly consider sleeping with anyone who couldn’t get her name right.
Jackie glanced around to see if the children were listening, but fortunately they were out of earshot.
Ari excused himself, saying he had a business call to make, and Jackie sat back and watched Lee, rambling on about the artists and musicians who hung out at Andy Warhol’s studio, and about her new plan to become an interior designer to the rich and famous.
Jackie wondered if her sister had drunk too much because she found the situation difficult. Maybe seeing Jackie with Ari was painful and she was using alcohol as an anesthetic. Jackie knew all about that. It was a habit she’d f
allen into after Jack died.
THE NEXT MORNING, Lee asked for a vodka and lime as soon as they hit the beach, and a waiter fetched her one from the little taverna that Jackie had remodeled there.
“You shouldn’t drink if you’re planning to swim later,” Jackie cautioned.
“When did you get to be so boring?” Lee snapped, then lay back on her sunbed with a straw hat over her face.
Ari had taken the children out sailing, and Jackie settled down to read a novel, but she kept an eye on Lee’s glass and noticed the level steadily descending. After she got back from a long swim, there was a fresh drink by Lee’s side. She drank wine with lunch, then returned to vodka and lime for the afternoon. That evening, she was unsteady on her feet long before they sat down for dinner, and virtually incoherent afterward.
“Do you think I should have a word with Lee about her drinking?” she asked Ari when they were alone later.
“Give me notice before you do and I’ll have riot police on standby,” he quipped.
“So you don’t think I should?”
He shook his head. “I think you are the last person she will take it from, and frankly I don’t want our vacation to turn into a battle zone.”
“Why did you give her that land when we got married? It’s not customary in America to give a dowry to the bride’s sister. Perhaps you didn’t realize.” She tried to speak with a light tone.
“You wanted her to come to the wedding. The only way I could get her to come was bribery. It worked, didn’t it?”
Jackie turned away. It was clear now that he had lied to her about the extent of his relationship with Lee. It must have been serious for her to feel quite so upset and betrayed. Had he let Lee believe he would marry her? Or had he used Lee to get close to her? She had a feeling it was better not to know the truth.
LEE’S DRINKING CONTINUED to be out of control through the rest of the vacation, but Jackie shrank from attempting to restrain her. All she could do was stop her from swimming in the sea when drunk, or behaving inappropriately in front of the children. Confrontation didn’t run in the Bouvier family. Difficult issues were swept under the rug. That was the way they’d been raised.
When did Lee start drinking so hard? Was it a trait they had inherited from their daddy?
Jackie had begun to monitor her own drinking after her psychiatrist had pointed out that her anxiety levels were always higher the day after she’d overindulged. There was a direct correlation. She decided to discuss Lee’s problem with the psychiatrist upon her return to New York. For now, she didn’t have the courage to rock the boat. All her efforts were focused on trying to heal the rift and become her sister’s friend again.
Act V
Chapter 71
Paris
January 23, 1973
Maria was at home in Paris when the telephone rang just before midnight. On the other end of the line there was a howl, like an animal caught in a steel trap.
“Help! Oh, God, help me!” It was Ari. She had never heard him in such anguish.
“What’s happened?” she asked, but for several minutes he just roared, unable to speak.
“It’s Alexander,” he managed at last. “He’s dead.” He started sobbing: big, ragged sobs that tore themselves from his throat.
At first, Maria couldn’t believe it. “No! How is that possible?”
“His plane crashed. Oh, Maria . . .”
She cradled the phone, so shocked she couldn’t take it in. “Calm down. Tell me what happened.”
“It was a conspiracy. The plane must have been sabotaged. It has to be Niarchos. Why else would a plane fail straight after takeoff? Witnesses say it hurtled from the sky like a stone, but planes don’t do that.” He was rambling, staccato, not making sense.
“I’m sure there will be an investigation. Don’t think about the cause for now,” she soothed.
“How can I think of anything else? I just had to ask doctors to switch off the machines keeping my son alive. His brain was destroyed. His poor brain!”
Maria listened as the words poured out, powerless to help.
“I flew in the world’s top neurosurgeon and offered him my entire fortune if he could save my son. Last night I kept vigil by his bed: I talked to him, kissed him, sang to him. I even prayed—can you believe it? Me praying? But there was no change. So today I gave them permission to switch off and he died two hours ago.” He burst into a fresh fit of sobbing that was dissonant, almost too painful to listen to.
“Oh, Ari, I wish I could have been with you, to support you.” Alexander had been twenty-four years old, with his whole life ahead of him. In a flash, she knew this was going to destroy Ari. How would he ever recover?
“Why didn’t Omero live?” he asked suddenly. “Then I would still have a son. Then I would have a reason to carry on living.”
“You have a daughter,” she reminded him. “Christina can take over the family business one day.” But she knew it wasn’t the same. Alexander had been trained for the role from birth. Ari was too old-fashioned to appoint a female CEO.
“What am I going to do?” he whispered. “I don’t know what to do.”
That was something Maria could help with. She had been in the depths of despair and had lifted herself up again, and she knew it could only be done step by tiny step. “First of all, you will give Alexander a beautiful funeral.”
“I don’t know if I can cope with a funeral!” he cried.
“You’ll do it privately, without cameras, with only close family present,” she said. “You must look after Christina, because she will take this loss at least as hard as you. Then you will make sure that Fiona Thyssen is well taken care of, because you know that’s what Alexander would have wanted.”
He gave a heavy sigh, and she sensed him struggling for control. “All I want to do is go to the mortuary and lie beside him.”
“You need sleep, Ari. Go to bed.”
“I’m lying on my bed, but I can’t bear to be alone. Please don’t leave me, Maria.”
She wondered where Mrs. Kennedy was, but didn’t want to ask. “Let me transfer this call to my bedroom telephone; then I will stay on the line as you fall asleep.”
She picked up her bedside receiver, kicked off her shoes, and lay full-length on the bed. She kept her voice low and melodic as she spoke, trying to lull him to sleep. “You will get through this, Ari, because you are the strongest man I’ve ever met. One day you will meet Alexander again, of that I have no doubt.”
“In heaven?” He wasn’t convinced.
“Yes, in heaven, and I think he will watch over you on earth too. A bond like yours does not simply disappear.”
“I wish you were here,” he murmured. “I need you.”
“I am here, my love.” She lay still now, listening to his slow breathing, and imagining the twitch of his muscles as he slid through the transition into sleep. If only she could take away the pain that would overwhelm him afresh when he awoke in the morning.
She had never loved him as much as she did at that moment. And she had never feared for him as much.
Chapter 72
Athens
Summer 1973
Jackie was astonished by the physical changes in Ari in the months after Alexander’s death. He’d always had a muscular physique with a slight paunch, like a prizefighter who had eaten a few too many good dinners. Now he was scrawny, his muscles wasted, and his posture stooped like an old man’s, although he was only sixty-seven.
“Stand straight,” she urged, pressing the middle of his back. “Head up, shoulders down!”
He raised himself upright, only to slouch again minutes later, as if the effort was too much to maintain. His face had taken on the ruddy look of a drinker, and his eyes drooped as if the flesh were stretched and misshapen by all the tears he had shed.
Their five-year marriage had been through many trials: Jackie’s decision to spend the better part of the year in New York with her children; his explosions of temper abou
t her spending; his affair with Maria Callas; his lies over his affair with Lee. Yet somehow they were still together, and with each passing year she’d grown fonder of him. Life hadn’t given him an easy ride, but he drove himself relentlessly in his desire to be “the best,” and she respected that.
She felt stronger after her secret sessions with her psychiatrist. As well as helping her control irrational panic, the therapist had also guided her to explore the reasons for her feelings of helplessness. When Jackie was a teenager, her mother had repeatedly emphasized the importance of finding a husband who earned enough to keep her in the style to which she had become accustomed: “Money and power, girls. That’s what you need to marry.” She’d cultivated in them an appetite for beautiful surroundings: antiques, designer clothes, fine porcelain, French perfume. Owning such things was the measure of a successful life, according to Janet Auchincloss. But because women of Jackie’s class did not work after marriage, that left her entirely reliant on her husband. She needed a man to look after her—then Jack was taken from her in a single shocking act of violence. It was no wonder her recovery was taking longer than might be expected for a normal bereavement.
Jackie had never told Ari about her sessions on the psychiatrist’s couch. He would have seen them as a sign of weakness. No one knew apart from her, the shrink, and the Secret Service officer who had recommended therapy. It was a place where she could talk about anything that was on her mind, without worrying about it ending up in the press. Quiet, private, just for her.
When Ari fell apart after Alexander died, it came as a surprise; he’d been such a lion of a man before. She couldn’t help but compare him to Rose Kennedy, who had stayed so strong after everything that had happened to her. Why couldn’t he do the same? Still, she felt huge compassion for him; perhaps it could even be called love.
AFTER ALEXANDER’S BURIAL on Skorpios, Jackie arranged a trip to the Caribbean aboard the Christina to distract her husband from his grief, but the voyage was marred by his heavy drinking and outbursts of uncontrollable rage. He refused to talk about his loss, refused to be comforted.
