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“What?”

Sam Giancana was the boss of the so-called Chicago Outfit. I’d heard his name mentioned all around me, but I’d never met him. Some people said he was nice and some said he was not so nice. “Why on earth would he want to move in with us?” I asked.

Sidney explained that Giancana had some legal problem and was due in court, but he hoped to lie low in Palm Springs instead.

“Why with us, though? We’d never dream of inviting him!”

“That wouldn’t make any difference,” Sidney replied. “People like Sam Giancana don’t wait around for an invite.”

“Over my dead body!” I replied (and it may well have been). Fortunately for us both, Mr. Giancana’s plans changed.

I’d had my first brush with the Mob shortly after Frank and I were married, and I didn’t relish the next. We were in New York and due to have dinner with the former mayor Bob Wagner and several notable New Yorkers when Eliot Weisman and Jilly told me that Frank had been asked if he could stop in somewhere on the way to introduce me to “the Harvard boys.” I told them curtly, “No, thank you.”

Eliot’s face fell. “Well, won’t you just go by and shake hands with them?” he asked. “They only want to meet you and pay their respects to Frank’s new wife, that’s all.”

“I don’t want to.” As far as I was concerned, that was the end of that.

We went for the dinner as planned and had a lovely evening. As we were leaving the restaurant, we walked past the bar, and there was Jilly waiting with a group of men all huddled together waiting to pay their respects. Because I wouldn’t go to them, they’d come to me, it seemed. Frank gave me a look and nudged me toward the bar. Jilly flashed me his puppy-dog eyes. The expressions on their faces were like those of hopeful children. I have no idea to this day who those men were, but Frank explained that they controlled venues that he (and many others) had played. They wanted proximity to Frank; they longed to be identified with him. “If I’m working some joint they own and they want their picture taken with me, I let them take it, but that doesn’t mean they own me too,” he said. With all eyes on me, I finally relented and allowed Frank to introduce me. I really couldn’t get out of it with them standing right there, so I shook their hands and said hello, and they were all very respectful and courteous. As we left the bar, I told Eliot and Jilly never to do that to me again, and to their credit, they never did.

Far more irritating than the men in ill-fitting suits were the paparazzi. We’d been chased by them since our first summer in Monaco, and their hunger for us never seemed to be sated. In Europe, especially, the photographers were overly zealous. Eydie Gorme and I were in Rome once, and the minute we left our hotel the photographers followed us closely, snapping away. Goodness alone knows who’d want to see a photo of me buying a new purse.

Being tall, I walk very fast, and Eydie tried to keep up with me, but she’s much shorter than I am and her little legs couldn’t carry her. Finally, she cried, “Barbara! I can’t go any farther!” and she stopped at a café to sit down. Waving good-bye, I made my way back to the hotel. When she eventually joined me, panting, I took pity on her and fixed her one of my famous Bloody Marys, which I make with tequila (not vodka), horseradish, Lea & Perrins sauce, Tabasco, lemon, and lime. Eydie drank a couple and then flopped on the couch.

I’d invited the jeweler Marina B to come to the suite with her wares so that Eydie and I could shop privately, but by the time she arrived Eydie was asleep. Marina had her jewelry in a black velvet roll and looked around for a flat surface. “Where shall I put it?” she asked.

Looking at Eydie, I smiled and said, “Roll it out on her chest. When she wakes up she’ll see it.” So Marina did as I suggested, and we pored over her jewelry with some girlfriends I’d invited over, but Eydie never woke up. Later, when she spotted my new trinkets, she said, “How come I didn’t see it? Where was I?”

“Underneath,” I told her.