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he’d have to check with his agent before signing anything.
    After their Vegas meeting ended, Lee learned that Siegel planned to return to L.A. Siegel offered Lee a ride but, knowing Siegel would use the six-hour trip to pressure him, Lee refused, saying he had other business to clear up in Vegas. Then, as part of his cover, he booked a room in a hotel for a one-night stay. That night Lee slept uneasily. By the next morning he’d made up his mind to call Siegel and sign the contract. But the headlines in the Vegas newspaper made the call unnecessary. Lee said that while driving back to Los Angeles, Siegel had been waylaid, and shot and killed in a gangland-style slaying. Had Lee been with him, he would undoubtedly have been murdered too.
    Whether by choice or necessity, Lee maintained a friendly relationship with the Mafia afterward. On two occasions, once in New York at an ultra-exclusive restaurant and once in Boston at a pizza joint in the heart of an Italian neighborhood, I accompanied Lee when he met a major Mafia don. Each time, I watched as Lee exchanged warm greetings, hugging the don and kissing his cheek. There was never any question in my mind that Lee had powerful and very dangerous friends.

4
    Lee used to say, with uncharacteristic modesty, “I’m just a piano player .”
    In my opinion he was “just a piano player” the way President Reagan is “just a politician.” Both men are great communicators; Reagan with the public and Lee with a nightclub audience. From the very beginning, it was Lee’s ability to reach out to his listeners that set him apart from his competition. Whatever mistakes he may have made in his private life, he never took a false step professionally.
    “An audience can spot a phony a mile away,” Lee told me. “If you don’t enjoy going out there, if you don’t love what you’re doing, they’ll know it.”
    Lee was one of those lucky entertainers who adored performing in front of a live audience. “Onstage,” he said, “I know who I am. I’m sure of myself, in complete control.” He had the rare capacity of making each individual in the audience feel that Liberace was performing just for him or her. Whether he played to ten people or ten thousand, Lee gave every show the same effort—working so hard that he often lost five pounds during his act.
    When I began working with Lee he had an enormous following and played to crowded rooms. But he had bittersweet memories about his early career when he had played to many near-empty ones. As any nightclub performer can tell you, second shows in supper clubs are notoriously dead. Americans just won’t wait until ten or eleven for their evening meal. But playing those depressingly unpopular second shows helped shape Lee’s act.
    “When there are ten thousand people waiting to see you and hear you,” Lee told me, “it’s impossible to single any one of them out. With a small audience it’s natural to feel as if you can talk to them individually.”
    Lee’s act was still in a formative stage in the late forties. It hadn’t yet acquired the glitz and the giant production numbers for which he is remembered. He owned several sets of conservative black tails, a piano, and a few candelabras. These were his only props as, night after night, he entertained the small second-show crowds. Instead of using expensive props and extravagant productions, which he couldn’t afford, he made the audience a part of the act. Old-fashioned sing-alongs were one of his favorite ways of pulling them inside each performance so that they became participants in their own entertainment. It was corny, like many of Lee’s gimmicks, but it worked.
    In my opinion, he was an uncommon man with a common touch. He never lost the ability to relate to the blue-collar working couple, the family who saved for weeks to treat themselves to a night on the town. One of his credos was “Never let an audience wonder what you plan to do. Tell them!”
    Every night his