"Here," he said to his young manager, Brian Epstein, "you do it."
"What are you so nervous about?" Epstein grinned, threading the stem into Ringo's buttonhole without difficulty. "All you've got to say is 'I Do.' "
Ringo flung him a dark look. "I've been up since five," he said. "I couldn't sleep. How about you? Were you awake too?"
"I slept fine," said Epstein, looking innocent. "I had no trouble at all, really."
"What about George and John then?"
"Talked to them just before I left my flat," Epstein said. "They've been up since 6:30. (That night George Harrison stayed at the Lennons.) They're fine."
"It's all right for them," Ringo said darkly. "Hey, what about making another cup of coffee for me?"
You've had four already," Epstein said. "Don't you think that's enough?"
"Five's a nice-sounding number," Ringo said, looking at himself in the long wall mirror to make sure his suit looked all right. "By the way, Brian, you got the ring all right? Where is it?"
"In my pocket," Epstein said. Jokingly, he put his hand into the wrong pocket and looked bewildered. Then he began a frantic search while Ringo looked on, making strange croaking noises. Finally, the ring was discovered - where it had been all along - in Epstein's wallet. With a cry of triumph Epstein held up the heavy gold carved ring he and Ringo had bought just two days earlier in London's very famous Burlington Arcade.
Ringo made a mock karate thrust at his manager. "Just don't do that when we get there," he said. "Otherwise you'll have to carry me out. As it is, the way I feel now you'll have to carry me in. I know I'll never make it alone. Never."
Epstein went into the kitchen to fix the coffee. Who'd have guessed it? he thought, as he boiled water for the fifth time that morning. Richie a married man. (Ringo, real name Richard Starkey, is always Richie to the group.) He remembered what Ringo had said in an interview only a few months before: "My girl will be just an ordinary sort of girl, but with just that something different. I wouldn't care if she couldn't cook - she'd learn." Well, thought Epstein, as he brought in the coffee to the lounge, that's Maureen Cox alright. She can't cook very well either, but she'd learning. She'll have to - Ringo can't boil an egg. But she has that something different Ringo's crazy about. And she certainly loves him. When Ringo was in the hospital having his tonsils out, she never left his side.
"How do you feel Richie?" he asked.
"I feel real ill," Ringo said. "What time is it?"
"Five to eight," Epstein answered. "Time we were off."
Ringo swigged down the coffee, took a last look at homself in the mirror, and then together they rode down in the elevator to the car waiting outside.
"Just drive to the end of Caxton Street," Epstein told the driver. "I want to make sure there isn't a mob waiting there for us."
They covered the mile to Caxton Hall very quickly, and, as the car pulled into Caxton Street, Epstein peered carefully towards the red-neon lit Hall.
"We're in luck," he told the nervous Ringo. "There's nobody there at all. Just a couple of workmen fixing the railings. Barry Digweed didn't let us down." Two days before, he had summoned Digweed to his flat, paid the three pounds, six and ninepence (about nine dollars) for the license, arranged for the marriage to take place two hours earlier than the normal 10:00 A.M. and then sworn Digweed to secrecy. It was a hard promise for Digweed to keep for he has two teenage daughters, Angela and Christina, and they are both wild Beatle fans. But he kept it. "The extraordinary thing," he said later, "was that nobody else twigged it (caught on). For by law I had to enter their names on the notice board. I suppose their real names fooled people."
The big, black Austin Princess saloon [automobile] drew up outside Caxton Hall and Ringo leaped out, closely followed by Epstein. They took the six steps two at a time and shook hands with Digweed, waiting at the top.
Then, as they walked on though the swingdoors, Harry Carpenter said: "That was one of them there Beatles, I'm sure of it." "Nah," his mate said, "you're imagining things." "Maybe you're right." Harry said. They went back to work.
In the foyer, waiting for Ringo and Epstein, were John and Cynthia Lennon, who had already arrived by Rolls, and George Harrison, who had come by bicycle. He is on a physical fitness kick at the moment: (and it is the quickest way to get about London), Ringo's parents were also there. They had come down from the little terraced house at Admiral Grove, Toxteth, near Liverpool Docks, the day before. So had Maureen's parents. They also live near the Liverpool Docks, in a small corporation apartment. The night before they'd all got together for a party.
Ringo looked around Digweed's office, with it's chairs, wall-to-wall flowered carpet and long red drapes.
"Where's Maureen?" he demanded.
"She's not arrived yet," Digweed said.
Ringo's eyes rose heavenwards and he went and flopped into one of the soft, red leather chairs, Epstein sat beside him.
"I'd rather perform before the North Vietnamese than go through this again," Ringo groaned. "My poor nerves."
Epstein grinned. "You're in good company," he said. "An awful lot of peoplehave done it before you."
Then, just as the clock on the wall showed ten minutes past eight, in came Maureen Cox and they both stood up.
The little eighteen-year-old ea-hairdresser's assistant from Liverpool, whom Ringo had been dating steadily for the past three years - ever since they met at Liverpoll's famed Cavern Club - looked lovely.
She was one of the most envied girls in the world at that moment, and she walked proudly as thogh she knew it. She was wearing an off-white suit and carrying a small spray of orchids. She stood for a moment in the door, looking shy but not nervous. "Hello, Ritchie," she said. "Hello, darling," he said. He went over and kissed her on the cheek.
"Shall we begin?" said Mr. Digweed.
Maureen and Ringo sat in two large red upholstered archairs in front of a kidney-shaped, green, leather top table. On the other side of the table sat Mr. Digweed. Epstein, the other two Beatles and the parents sat in the chairs behind Ringo and Maureen.
Normally, a registrar office marriage is breif, formal, almost cold-bloodedly matter of fact. You pay your money and you walk out five minutes later.
But Barry Digweed made this a special occasion. He performed the ceremony beautifully, and it lasted almost fifteen minutes.
Throughout, Ringo kept looking at Maureen. Twice they held hands. Then, as the ceremony came to a close, and Ringo slipped the ring on her finger and kissed her, all nervousness seemed to leave him. It was a curious transformation. Ringo, the latecomer to the group, the one who was always the shy one and who blossomed only after his success in America, blossomed once again. He was a married man. Taking Maureen by the hand, he went over to the desk to sign the register. (The entry read: Richard Starkey; age twenty-four; bachelor. Occupation: musician. Address: Flat 7, Whaddon House, William Mews, SW1, Father: Richard Starkey; Occupation: confectioner. Maureen Cox, age eighteen; Spinster; Occupation Nil. [She gave up hairdressing a year ago] Address: 56A Boundary Street, Liverpool 5, Father: Joseph Cox, ships' steward.)
Then came the congratulations from all sides, and worry seemed to drop from Ringo's shoulders like a mantle.
"Well," he gagged, his arm around Maureen, "who said it wouldn't last?"
The Caxton Hall photographer said: "Over here please," and they all trouped across the room for the wedding photograph. "Why haven't you two got carnations," Ringo said to John and George. "What are you doing at my wedding without carnations? What do you think this is?"
"We know what this is," lennon said. "That's why we planned to wear radishes."
"Not a bad idea," said Ringo. "They would have come in useful. Now, I've stopped feeling nervous I'm feeling hungry instead."
He took firm hold of Maureen's hand and they both stood there for the photograph - with george grinning his head off just behind Ringo.
"You know, George," Ringo said putting on a fatherly look. "You really ought to get married yourself. Marriage is really great. Take it from me."
"What I want to know," George said, "is how you proposed. You'd never get down on your knees with those trousers. You'd split them."
"He didn't go down on his knees," maureen said. "He proposed to me sitting right alongside me at the Ad Lib club. (One of London't swinging discotheques) At 2:00 in the morning, too. he put his hand on mine and said : 'Why don't we get married, kid?' just like that."
"I always knew that he was a romantic at heart," said lennon.
"He is," said Maureen. "He was born under the sign of Cancer. (Ringo's birthday is July 7.) he's very remonatic."
Epstein came over to congratulate them. So did Digweed.
"I bet you're glad you kept it a secret," Digweed said.
"You're darned right," Ringo said. "I wanted this to be Maureen's day, not a stage show."
"Well," quipped George, "now there are two married Beatles and two unmarried Beatles. Two down and two to go."
Turning to Maureen he said: "You were just great." To Digweed he said: "We threatened her that if she cried we wouldn't let her be one of the gang."
"But I almost did," Maureen said with a smile.
"Were you worried about it?" Mrs. Starkey asked Epstein.
"To be hinest, I was." Epstein said. "But now it's all over I know everything's fine. I do hope it won't make any diference to his popularity and that his fans will understand. It depends a lot, of course, on whether his popularity depends on his being a single man. Personally, I feel that his popularity lies in the fact that he's a great character. Still, let's face it: A lot of kids are going to be very unhappy tonight."
Everyone shook hands with Barry Digweed and then they all went out to the cars and drove to Epstein's house for breakfast.
Then, at eleven o'clock, Ringo and Maureen slipped away, to drive the sixty odd miles to Hove, on the south coast, for their brief three day honeymoon.
David Jacobs, The Beatles' solicitor, had lent them his house in Princes Crescent, an elegant, gabled place full of white and gold Italian furniture. "You'll get all the privacy you need there," he told them. And they did - for about five hours.
By nightfall, there were hundreds of fans outside the house. By next morning, those fans had been joined by some seventy representatives of the world's press.
There was nothing for it. Ringo and Maureen had come out to say hello. Ringo prefaced his remarks by saying: "Whoever gave away our secret - I'd like to break his neck." But they both looked very happy.
Then they answered the barrage of questions. And Maureen, the girl who started her married life in the limelight, had this to say: "From now on I'm staying in the background. I don't covet publicity.
"I just want to be Ringo's wife, and have his children."
How many?
"Four," said Ringo. "That way we can make a pop group."
Could she cook?
"No," said Maureen. "But I'm learning."
"She'd better," said Ringo. "I can't even make egg.
"Though," he added, "I'm good at preparing cornflakes." Where would they live?
"At Ringo's flat," said Maureen, "But we're going to look for a house of our own."
Were there any wedding presents?"
"None," said Ringo. "There just wasn't time. But there'll be some. Brian is giving us a Wedgwood dinner service."
Was it love at first sight?
"No." said Ringo. "We met a week after I joined the group at the Cavern Club in Liverpool. That was in 1962. I liked her immediately, but love came later."
"I always knew he'd marry me," said Maureen. "Deep down. He went on tours but he always called me. And he always came back to me."
And then she said: "I know I'm the envy of every girl. And I'm glad. For I married a wonderful boy. really, the swingingest Beatle of them all. And the funniest. I once asked him what fame had done for him and he said: 'Made me rich.' All I want to do is make him happy and keep him well. That's the lest I can do for all the people who love him, all over the world."