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Being a Rolling Stones fan is no way to make headlines—unless your name happens to be Margaret Trudeau. Then it is easy. All Margaret had to do was attend a couple of rare nightclub performances by that bad, bad band at Toronto's El Mocambo and mingle with the boys afterward. Trouble was, the first show coincided with the sixth anniversary of Margaret's wedding to Canada's Prime Minister, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, 57. Leaving husband and three children in Ottawa, Margaret, 28, had checked in at the Stones' hotel and stayed up with the group into the early-morning hours. That was enough to set tongues and typewriters clacking. Margaret apparently had a grand time, though, and only Stones Guitarist Keith Richard seemed to feel a little the worse for wear. But then, Richard had reason. Only a week before, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police found 22 grams of heroin in his hotel room and charged Richard with possession for the purpose of trafficking. Under Canadian law, he theoretically faces life imprisonment if found guilty. (Richard also faces a much less serious charge of possession of cocaine.) Was this the kind of company for the wife of Canada's head of government to be keeping? Almost everybody except Margaret clearly felt not. Even Stones Drummer Charlie Watts was overheard to mutter to Bassist Bill Wyman, "I wouldn't want my wife associating with us."
In the midst of the disapproving din, Margaret flew to New York City, and promptly disappeared from public view. Headed the same way, on a different flight, were Stones Lead Singer Mick Jagger and Guitarist Ron Wood. Newspapers raised their collective eyebrows at the coincidence. After two days of hubbub, Margaret calmly appeared in public in the company of Princess Yasmin Khan, at whose apartment she was staying. The two women arrived at the ballet to watch Mikhail Baryshnikov dance. All the frenzy, said Margaret, was nonsense. Said she: "Look, I'm a married lady. I love my husband and I love music." Her New York trip, she added, was a vacation devoted to photography. Said Trudeau, back in Ottawa: "This has been planned for some time." An aggrieved Jagger added his own disclaimer. From the Manhattan town house where he was staying with his wife Bianca and their ailing five-year-old daughter, the Prince of Rock declared that hints of dalliance with Margaret were "insulting to me and insulting to her."