His Way_ The Unauthorized Biography of Frank Sinatra - Kitty Kelley [124]
Frank canceled the rest of his tour and returned to London with Ava, where they fought so bitterly that they were almost evicted from their apartment.
Ava had three weeks’ work to do on her film and asked Frank to stay with her so that they could return to New York together, but he refused, saying he had to leave immediately to rehearse for his engagement at Bill Miller’s Riviera in Englewood, New Jersey. “I have a career, too, you know,” he said.
Ava was so angry that she refused to notify him of her arrival in the U.S. a week later; he read of it in a newspaper. He was furious when he learned that she had gone to the Hampshire House, when she knew he was staying at the Waldorf Towers. Neither would telephone the other, but both talked freely to reporters.
“I saw a picture of Ava at the airport and that’s the first inkling I had that she was in town,” Frank said. “I don’t understand it. We’d had no trouble. I can’t make a statement because I don’t know what she is planning. It’s a crying shame, because everything was going so well with us. Something may work out, but I don’t know.”
Ava refused to be specific, but she indicated that perhaps marriage was too hard for her. “You start with love, or what you think is love, and then comes the work,” she said. “I guess you have to be mature and grown up to know how to work at it. But I was the youngest of seven kids and was always treated like the baby, and I liked it, and played the baby. Now I’m having a helluva time growing up.”
Dolly Sinatra was distressed by what was happening to her son. She called Ava at her hotel to find out what was wrong. “She said to please come right over,” Dolly said. “She kissed me, and after a few minutes she began to cry. She had been tired, she said, when the plane came in, and when she didn’t see Frank, she felt bad. Then she found out he was in Atlantic City with me and said, ‘Mama, I don’t know how to explain this, but I know how little you get to see him. I thought for once you’re together, just the two of you, and I didn’t want to spoil it.’ ”
Determined to bring them back together, Dolly invited Ava to dinner the next night. Then she called Frank. “I know he can be a little stubborn sometimes, and I decided to do this my way. I called him up and told him I was going to make a nice Italian meal the next night, Monday, and would he come over between shows.
“So he says to me, ‘Who’s gonna be there?’ And I says, ‘Never mind; you just come.’ Ava got there first, at about six-thirty. Frank got there at seven. He walked in and I think he almost expected to see Ava there. He looked happy. They both did. But they were just standing there, not saying anything.
“This is where mothers come in. ‘Hey,’ I said to both of them. ‘Come into the kitchen and see what I’m making for you tonight.’ They both followed me in, and we walked to the stove, and I took the big spoon I use for stirring the gravy, and I made them both taste it. Then they both began to laugh and talk and before you knew it they were hugging each other, and then they grabbed me and the three of us stood there just hugging and laughing, and I think we all felt like crying a little bit too.”
That night, Ava went back to the Hampshire House while Frank left to perform at the Riviera. “Stay up and wait for me, baby,” he said. But after his last show, he went to Lindy’s with the boys and did not show up until four A.M., which infuriated Ava.
“Isn’t it kind of late to be coming home?” she asked.
Frank bristled. “Don’t cut the corners too close on me, baby,” he said. “This is the way my life is going to be from now on.”
Ava related this incident to friends as evidence that the lovable Frankie she had married was now an overbearing, inconsiderate boor.
“When he was down and out, he was so sweet,” she said, “but when he got back to the top again, it was hell. Now that he’s got successful again, he’s