“Yes, congrats on the wedding, Sammy,” Street said. “I read it was going to be last September, then I saw it was delayed a few months. She got jitters?”

Davis swiveled around dramatically to see if anyone was listening; he always moved with broad determination, as if a camera were recording every gesture.

“The old man, President Kennedy’s dad, made a specific request that I not get married before the election,” Davis confided. “The election was tight, and Jack was so publicly associated with our gang, he was worried about a backlash if I married May before the vote. Frank asked me to hold off, so I did. And I was rewarded by being blackballed from the inaugural gala. Pun intended.”

“You were blackballed?” Charlie asked incredulously. The Streets had brought the Marders to the event, which was held at the National Armory, hosted by Sinatra, and featured Gene Kelly, Milton Berle, Jimmy Durante, Tony Curtis, Janet Leigh, Laurence Olivier, and Bette Davis, among other stars.

“Nat King Cole and Sidney Poitier performed,” Margaret recalled.

“Maria Cole and Juanita Poitier ain’t white,” Davis noted. “This is, of course, entre nous. Frank would be furious if he found out I told you all this.”

“See, that really gets me,” Street said. “Why do you put up with that from Frank?”

“From Frank?” Davis said. “That wasn’t from Frank. That was from the president, man. Or, more accurately, from his dad—el padrino, the Ambassador.”

“Okay, but Frank delivered the message, and he’s the one making all those darkie jokes onstage,” Street said. “You’re up there saying, ‘Okay, Massuh Dean, Massuh Frank!’”

Charlie knew that Street, like Jackie Robinson, hid his righteous anger behind a polite veneer. Rarely, and only in discreet settings, would he express outrage at the indignities he suffered as a Black man in the United States of America. Charlie had never heard Street talk like this in public. He suspected his friend had imbibed a bit much, as had they all. Charlie tensed, unsure of how Davis would react.

The singer took a long drag on his cigarette and exhaled slowly.

“We’re just having fun out there, man,” Davis finally said. “I make jokes about them too. The audience loves it. You need to understand something about Frank. He took me under his wing. I was living in Harlem, my family was on welfare. We were just a hoofing act! Frank saw us and hired us for his show, paid us twelve hundred and fifty dollars a week. All the money in the world. Frank would come out, open up, sing a couple songs. He’d say things like ‘I want you to keep an eye on the little cat in the middle.’ He’d say, ‘You watch him, he burns the stage out!’”

“Really?” Margaret said. She’d never heard any of this before.