She says she chose to stay on in Italy, instead of returning home with Getty, to study and to demonstrate her independence. She might have asked herself why, during those two years, Paul did not seem entirely desperate to get her back. But this was not a woman keen on asking questions. Instead, she practiced the First Rule of Marrying a Man on the World Stage: Find something splendid in everything he does. She writes, for example, that he was a wonderful dancer and a great lover. Was it any surprise that women flocked to him, that they — and he — couldn’t resist? He was a connoisseur with a most discerning eye; we do not hear the stories about his apparent admiration for Hitler in the late 1930s or the interest he reportedly showed in treasures the Nazis had stolen from Jews. Getty provided her with glorious houses and a glorious life — on his terms (which for years meant keeping him and their young son, Timmy, as far away from each other as possible). So what if one of the richest men in the world wouldn’t pay the taxes on her mother’s ancestral home in New England when she fell on hard times? “Paying Mom’s debts and saving her home was not Paul’s business, . . . and I should have realized I was acting like a spoiled brat to think he should.”

It took more than a decade for Teddy to see that perhaps that admirable frugality had a dark side. After securing an enormous tract of oil-rich Saudi Arabian land, Getty lived for years in Europe. He wrote self-pitying letters claiming profound loneliness and love for Teddy and Timmy, while refusing to let them visit. In 1952, when Timmy was 6, the child fell ill with a brain tumor. It quickly blinded him. Getty flew mother and son to New York to see specialists, promised to visit and never did. Then came the admonishing letters — over the pony she bought for the boy’s exercise (which he insisted she pay for out of her allowance “with reasonable promptitude”) and the medical bills. “I’m glad that you realize they are enormous,” he wrote later that year. “You should always, if there is time, and there was in this case, have an agreement in advance as to what the charges will be. Some doctors like to charge a rich person 20 times more than their regular fee.” The child died at 12. Getty regretted he couldn’t make it to the funeral, and Teddy divorced him soon thereafter.

“Alone Together” is a private memoir of a public man, and a very whitewashed one. We hear about the little Donald Duck stuffed toys they exchanged, but nothing substantive about his business, his relationships with world leaders, his other wives and children, or the famous kidnapping and mutilation of his grandson and the ransom Getty bargained down before finally paying. (From about $17 million to $2.2 million — just the amount that would be tax-deductible.) Much here reflects the fond, and I suspect unreliable, memories of a lovely and loving, now 99-year-old woman. But then, perhaps we shouldn’t always read memoirs for facts; we should sometimes read them to get closer to the subject.

One scene speaks volumes: In a rare visit home for Getty, Timmy brings his dad into the living room to play him his first piece on the piano. This is how Teddy remembers the moment: “Paul was visibly affected by Timmy’s concentrated effort, and applauded him. Then, it was his turn to surprise Timmy, and he sat down at the piano and played a Rachmaninoff prelude for us. Timmy watched his father, intently fascinated. When Paul finished, Timmy walked over to the piano, took one of Paul’s hands in his tiny little hands, and said, ‘Oh — thank you, Daddy, for such an excellent concert.’ ”