“Francis, she wrote nice things too,” said MacLaine. “Compliments about your charm and your talent and how you’re willing to do anything for friends. Yes, there was some nasty stuff, but what do you want? She and Nancy are like sisters.” Sinatra and his first wife, Nancy, had divorced in 1951 after twelve years of marriage. They had three kids: Nancy, twenty-one, Frank Jr., seventeen, and Tina, thirteen.

“There’s also, if you’ll permit me, my captain, quite a lot of praise for you as a father,” Davis offered. “As I understand it, that is. I would never peruse such garbage.”

“Honestly, who even reads a book by a gossip columnist?” asked Martin. “She’s been on our drop-dead list forever.” Martin then began to belt out as if he were onstage:

She’s the worst

She’s a Vegas has-been

She’s accursed

She’s Joey Bishop’s foreskin

But Sinatra was immune to Martin’s charms at the moment. “She’s a cunt,” he spat.

Margaret flinched, then glanced at Britt and MacLaine, who subtly rolled their eyes at each other. Martin lightly patted Sinatra on the shoulder as if consoling him. Margaret looked around the table, but everyone avoided eye contact with her, even—maybe especially—the women.

Charlie was making his way back to his wife when he felt a tug on his arm. He turned around to see Manny Fontaine. “Hey, pal!” the United Artists PR flack said, wobbling. He was solidly in the bag. Charlie looked at his watch—it was just after eight p.m.

“Hey there, Manny.”

“Don’t tell anyone, but it looks like Chris Powell was a Mob hit.” Charlie could smell the gin oozing out of the man as he leaned closer. Manny’s face was alight with ghoulish enthusiasm. “Shot through the eyes. Both of them! Blang! Blang!”

“I heard that as well,” Charlie said, wishing he could extricate himself from the conversation.

“Well, this is no good for Frank or for the studio. Frank’s rival rubbed out by the Mob!”

Charlie was skeptical of that theory. “Because they were competing for a girl?”

“Competing for Lola now, competing for parts in pictures in a few years, maybe? Powell was a comer.”

“So the Mob had him killed on Frank’s behalf? You really think that?”

“Oh no, no, no, no, no, no,” Fontaine said. Suddenly a sober expression came across his face and he lowered his voice. “I don’t know, stranger things have happened. You know how they got Frank out of his first contract with Tommy Dorsey?”

“I’d heard rumors.”