America's queen : the life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis by Bradford Sarah 1938-

Author:Bradford, Sarah, 1938-
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Onassis, Jacqueline Kennedy, 1929-1994, Celebrities, Presidents' spouses
Publisher: New York : Viking
Published: 2000-12-03T05:00:00+00:00

Jackie spent her days reading, painting, resting for the birth of her baby and planning, just as she had in 1960, in the weeks before the birth of John Jr., either in her bedroom or the adjoining closed-in porch that she used as an office. She was looking ahead to autumn at the White House, selecting menus for State visits, ensuring that, in response to press criticism, there should be less French and more English on them—Eggs Mollet, for instance, instead of Oeufs Mollets. She was even drawing up lists of Christmas presents—J. B. West was to receive a cushion embroidered, "You don't have to be mad to work here but it helps." Jackie herself wanted a fur bedspread as a present from all the family—the choice ranged from rabbit at $350 to chinchilla at $4,000. Caroline was to have a party for her cousins around the time of Jackie's birthday—there were ten in Caroline's age group, and ten in John Jr.'s. With Oleg Cassini Jackie was already working on a postnatal wardrobe, she planned to use an exercise machine in Morton Downey's basement to work on getting her figure back in shape.

On July 19 there was yet another Kennedy christening, of Bobby and Ethel's eighth child, Christopher George Kennedy. Jack and Jackie were there with Lem Billings. On the weekend of August 2, the Fays were staying at Squaw Island with the Kennedys, when Paul Fay walked into Jack's bedroom at his invitation and found Jack and Jackie in bed together: "She was lying there with him and I guess felt uncomfortable, but she just wanted to be with him, so they were lying there in each other's arms and chatting . . ."

But August, instead of being a joyful month as Jackie had anticipated, was destined for tragedy. On Saturday August 3, their friend, the brilliant Phil Graham, publisher of the Washington Post and Newsweek, still suffering from depression, shot himself on his first day home from the hospital, hlis funeral was held on Tuesday, August 6, in Washington National Cathedral. Jack attended the service, walking by himself up a side aisle after everyone else was seated and taking his place. "The sun shone through the stained-glass windows, somehow illuminating him," Phil's widow, Kay, remembered. Jackie had written her an eight-page letter—"one of the most understanding and comforting of any 1 received . . ."^^

Phil Graham's death was the second suicide in their circle that year. In April Charlene Cassini, daughter of Charles Wrightsman by his first marriage and wife of Igor, died of an overdose of sleeping pills at the age of thirty-eight. FHer death touched the Kennedys, not because they were close but because they were indirectly involved. In February, Igor's Dominican connections came back to haunt him and he was indicted, at Bobby's instance, for failure to register his position as a foreign agent, among related charges. On March 31 Charlene had written Jack a long, desperate letter, appealing to him to restrain Bobby. The

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