"Revson always had me sit with people," Botwin explains, "because he was always an hour late for any meeting. Rather than have someone sit in the office all by himself, he'd say, 'Irving, sit with the guy; I'll join you shortly.'"

The man Irving was sitting with had come on behalf of Temple Emanu-El, of which Revson was an inactive member, to solicit money for a building fund. He was new to this, Irving recalls his saying, had never approached anyone for a contribution before . . . but, being a C.P.A. and active in the temple, they had made him chairman of the drive. He was understandably nervous about meeting Revson, and wanted to know what he was like.

"He's not going to bite you," said Irving. "The worst that can happen is that he says no."

Charles comes in, Irving introduces them, and Revson says, "I suppose you're here on behalf of the temple?" The man says, "Yes, we have a drive on for the building fund." Revson says, "I'm in between meetings and I know you're busy and I don't want to waste your time and you probably want to get home to your dinner . . ." It was by now around six-thirty. " . . . Irving, give him twenty-five thousand dollars." And he shook the man's hand and walked out.

"The guy started to tremble," says Irving. "He probably would have been happy to get two thousand. I started to walk him back to the elevator and I could see he couldn't put his coat on; he couldn't find the sleeves. He said: 'That's the most remarkable guy I've ever met in my life.'"

The man from the temple, Alfred Bachrach, remembers the incident a little differently, though with much the same result. He wasn't chairman of the building drive, he was president of the temple. He wasn't new to the fund-raising business, he had already received $25,000 and $50,000 donations from several prime donors. It's true he was a bit leery of his meeting with Revson, but as no one on the fund-raising committee had really known him, it fell to Bachrach to make the approach. Charles came in, Bachrach described the new school the temple was trying to build, Charles said he was interested in the temple even though he wasn't able to attend as often as he would have liked, and asked what "they" were giving, meaning the other prominent members. They were giving $25,000 or $50,000, Bachrach said, using some names he'd been given permission to use, and Charles generously offered $25,000, the amount for which a classroom would be named in his honor. Appreciative as he was, it is unlikely that Bachrach trembled unduly. But the essence of the story -- Charles's generosity -- holds. Over the years he gave many millions of dollars to Jewish, medical, and educational causes. Roughly fifty million more -- half his estate -- was placed in a charitable foundation upon his death.

Many of his most touching gifts -- $1,000 to the Cuban refugee brother of a manicurist at The House of Revlon, for example -- were purely spontaneous, in no way publicized and, for that matter, not even tax deductible.

Like most donors, Charles was both embarrassed by, and eager for, recognition of his generosity. Those who spoke of his "buying his way into heaven" were simply unfair. If he was no more purely altruistic than the next guy, he was also no less. He believed, as he stated often, that "we who take have got to give." He felt particularly strongly about supporting the state of Israel. Why should he build a factory there when it looked as though it would be more economical to ship goods in from other markets? "Because we're Jews, that's why," he told his financial vice president. He was not one for prayers, and he knew little of the history of his people -- but he knew who his people were.

And now, August 26, 1975, after a year-long struggle with pancreatic cancer (an unusual variety of cancer -- of which, through some morbid coincidence, Kay Daly passed away just months after her former boss), he was being credited by the rabbi at Temple Emanu-El with having been "a giant" among those people. Nearly a thousand of them -- many current and former employees -- had come to his funeral. ("I wouldn't have missed this one for the world," said Bill Mandel on the way in.) And when former judge Simon Rifkind, who delivered the eulogy, characterized Charles's unbending perfectionism as having been "both his greatest strength and his greatest failing," nearly a thousand heads nodded imperceptibly.

Lyn's among them. She had arrived at the temple in a white, low-cut dress, her hair disheveled-looking exactly as her former husband would not have wanted her to look. No seat had been reserved for her. Unlike Ancky, she was not considered a member of the immediate family.

By his sixty-eighth birthday, however -- October 11, 1974 -- he had already been in the hospital for an operation on "an obstructive jaundice due to a gallstone" -- they thought he had hepatitis at first -- and he knew he would soon be going back for more treatment. The ritual surprise party held for him in the office each year thus took on a special significance. "All his birthday parties were moving," Paul Woolard, head of Revlon domestic, reflects, "because he had an ambivalent attitude toward them. He didn't want anything to be done, yet I think he really was touched that his people would remember him and respect him and thank him."

Before this last party, Woolard acted as decoy while everyone gathered in the executive dining room. Charles was trying on a new fedora -- he loved hats -- with a broad band and a snap-down brim. "He kept trying it on and asking me how I liked it," says Woolard, "and he looked good. He always looked good." Meanwhile, Revson's secretary kept coming in with messages for Woolard about the people who were gathering. When everyone had assembled, Woolard told him he had a very private matter to discuss with him -- would he mind coming into the next room? "You shit," said Revson, "you did it -- didn't you?" Woolard played dumb, but the jig was up. So they went into the adjoining dining room amidst the applause of everyone from Mickey Soroko to John and Charles Revson, Jr. (but not a woman in the crowd).

There was champagne and low-cholesterol cake, and some gag telegrams the advertising people had come up with, as well as a handsome oriental chest for which they had all chipped in. Charles began to say something, but his voice was quivering. "I didn't think I was going to make it this year," he started to say -- and he began to cry. He actually began to cry. He quickly left the room. Woolard started to say something -- and he too choked up. "Well, that proves he's human," someone said, to break the uncomfortable silence. Once Charles had regained control, he returned to the room and said something about it's having been a tough year, but that he was feeling better and was looking forward to more parties like this one. Then they had lunch and got back to business.

It was the beginning of the end of what had been a lifelong, all-consuming love affair. But it was also a measure of his remarkable self-discipline and clear thinking that he had decided to begin a process of orderly succession. Other founder/chief-executives run their companies halfway into senility and halfway into the ground rather than relinquish the reins to an able successor -- Elizabeth Arden was a case in point.

In Revson's judgment, no one man within the company stood out sufficiently to be certain of commanding unquestioned respect and unchallenged authority. With Mandel's departure, Paul Woolard had become the front-runner. Victor Barnett had high hopes, as well. But talented as Woolard was, efficient as Barnett was, Revson shrewdly decided to go after a man head and shoulders above the rest.

Bergerac was then head of ITT/Europe, with $5 billion in sales. His brother, Jacques, had been known primarily as Ginger Rogers' handsome husband until, at the age of forty, he met Charles Revson at a party on Earl Blackwell's terrace and decided to give up his mediocre career in grade B movies (Les Girls, Gigi, Taffy and the Jungle Hunter) for a role in the cosmetics business. He spent a year learning the business behind the cosmetic counters at Abraham & Straus and Bambergers, in training classes, and at the lab, and soon after rose to head Revlon/France. Supposedly, the negotiations between Revson and his brother Michel were kept so secret that Jacques learned of them only when the deal was announced.

To initiate contact, Charles had called Bergerac at ITT/ Europe headquarters in Brussels. "This is Charles Revson," he said. "I guess you know who I am." Of course. "I understand that you come to New York once a month, and I wonder whether you could have dinner with me on your next trip." Certainly.

After a dinner at the Revson apartment during which nothing of substance was discussed, Charles asked Bergerac if he could guess why he had been asked to come. Bergerac, model of the efficient, well-organized, modern global executive, answered that it would be one of three things: "You could be having trouble with one of your companies in Europe and need my assistance, which I would naturally be delighted to give; you could be interested in selling your company for estate purposes; or you could want to hire me." Charles was so incensed at the idea that he might want to sell Revlon that he flew into a (controlled) rage. "This company will never be sold out to anyone! No one is going to take over Revlon, now or ever." And so on. It was only after he had established that point beyond any conceivable doubt that he returned to the third of Bergerac's alternatives. Yes, he wanted Bergerac to become president of Revlon.

A result of Bergerac's leadership skill, and of some enormous financial incentives, was that none of Revlon's veterans left the company. Not even Woolard, despite his disappointment. (Barnett was soon moved into a staff position, where his dedication and acumen could be put to good use, but where he would be less apt to antagonize his colleagues. This move alone was enough to win Bergerac considerable loyalty among the other veterans. Shortly thereafter, he resigned.)

Revlon won't fall apart without Revson, in part because of Bergerac, but also because -- despite all the turnover -- he built an organization with depth. He reproduced himself. It wasn't always the most pleasant training, but it pervades the entire cosmetics industry. When Suzanne Grayson, who left Revlon to build her own company, examines a product, her question is always: "Would Charles approve this?" As one observer put it, he carved his initials into everyone he ever worked with.

Peter's parents and uncle had never approved of his career, opposing it most vehemently after his younger brother, Douglas, also a race-car driver, died in a crash in Denmark in 1967. Whatever strain Peter's career must have placed on his father, his uncle dealt with it by adopting a sort of fatalistic attitude. When Lyn called to tell him that Peter, racing in 1971 at Indianapolis, had hit the wall and was being rushed to the hospital (unscathed as it turned out, but Charles didn't know that), he turned to the men he was meeting with, told them what had happened and, although visibly upset, said simply: "You're in that business, you take that chance."

Now Peter had been killed, and his uncle, tears in his eyes, flew up to New York for the funeral.

Charles, Jr., does have some of his father's characteristics. I could see him staring in amazement at my brown shoes (scuffed, at that), wondering how someone otherwise presentable could be so gauche; and he had the captain move us to what was apparently "a better table." But he is much easier going than his father was or his brother is. At least this much can be said for John: once you do manage to get him on the phone, you get straight answers. If, as his father was, he is no diplomat, neither does he mince words or "beat around the rosary bush." And if he does not have all of his father's shrewdness and drive, he does have some of it.

Demanding as much from his sons as from his other executives -- or more -- Charles, much as he loved them, was not satisfied. Charles, Jr., was responsible -- but he just didn't seem to grasp the overwhelming, all-consuming importance of the business. John had the spark -- but not the same sense of responsibility. "I saw John and his father get on the elevator one day four or five years ago, when John was between wives and living at home," says a former colleague, "and it's a long ride up forty-nine flights. John looked bad. He always looked like he'd been out all night. His hair was always a mess . . . Charles is in one comer of the elevator and John is at the opposite end, and I'm in there with about seven other people. 'What time did you get in last night?' Charles asks him in that whine of his. 'About three-thirty,' John says. 'Goddamn it, I was down in your room at twelve and you weren't there, and at one, looking for you -- I had some great ideas and you're not there. Where were you, the Hippopotamus with some broad? Three-fifty, four bucks a drink -- what happens if you weren't a vice president? What if I made you a goddamned clerk -- would that keep you home? Here I'm paying you whatever it is and when I come to talk to you, you're not home . . .'"

A few years earlier, Revlon had got a terrific write-up in Women's Wear -- it was all "Revlon says this" and "Revlon is bringing out that" -- a very positive piece -- and Charles called his PR man, Warren Leslie, livid. Furious. Why? "It should be personalized! I want it personalized!" Mandel had been trying to convey just the opposite image -- that Revlon was an ongoing corporation, not a one-man show -- so that Wall Street would have more confidence. But Charles wanted to be portrayed as the last word in fashion and marketing. Wall Street would keep buying the stock, he said, as long as they kept showing the earnings. And he was right.

And so it was that month by month the charles revson grew into Charles Revson into Charles Revson into CHARLES REVSON, in ads and package designs. By the time of his death, there was a CHR line, a Charles Revson, Inc., a wildly successful perfume called Charlie (which blossomed into a full cosmetics line), and a men's line that would be introduced called Chaz. No one will say whether Jontue, a fragrance that followed Charlie, was a coy bow in the direction of "John, too."

Probably not, but the question of John's future role in the company is often raised. And that, in turn, raises the question of Charles's will -- a curious document. Neither John nor Charles was given a seat on the board of the Revson Foundation, into which half Revson's estate was placed. Nor were they given control over much of the other half, even though a good deal of it is being held in trust for them. Thus neither son has a significant block of Revlon stock to vote. Instead, the foundation, as well as the various trusts set up in the will, are directed by Charles's executors, Harry Meresman and Simon Rifkind, with Victor Barnett named as an alternate.

The executors receive $1 million to execute the estate -- a far cry from the $15 a month Harry Meresman pulled down when Revson first put him on retainer. There is no love lost between the irrepressible, and at times irresponsible, John and Harry Meresman, who is professionalism personified (and who, when I saw him a few days before Christmas 1975, was wearing a plain black suit, black socks and shoes, a white shirt, and, for contrast, a solid black tie). Even Charles had begun to consider Harry a little "square" as he himself was exposed to the limelight, and so dropped him from his list of social regulars. But he trusted him implicitly, and presumably was depending on him to provide the kind of discipline he felt John lacked. (What discipline Meresman does not provide, the Securities and Exchange Commission might: Months after his father's death, John was charged by the S.E.C. with stock market manipulation in concert with, among others, ex-embezzler Eddie Gilbert.)

Beyond pointing out that Bill White had been on the corporate payroll all those years, not on Charles's personal staff, neither Irving Botwin -- dumbfounded by his good fortune -- nor Harry Meresman, who helped prepare the will, could offer any explanation or rationale for the seeming omissions. "You never knew what that man was thinking," Botwin says of his departed friend and benefactor.