Photoplay (Jan-Jun 1959)

SUSAN HAYWARD Continued from page 66 the wide lawns, the roomy houses with their ante-bellum pillars and porticos, and the occasional new ranch house with its picture windows glinting in the sunlight. She turned a corner and came out onto the modest shopping street. “Mornin’, Mrs. Chalkley,” a farmer in overalls called to her and she smiled back at him as she continued on past the haberdashery and shoe stores, past the gleaming front of the new supermarket and the savory smells of the barbecue stand close by it, past the still-shuttered ticket cage of the movie theater. She skirted a pile of cardboard cartons waiting to be carried inside the general-notions store, waved at a man in a white apron who was polishing the word “French” on the window of the dry cleaners’, and then came back to where she had left her car, in front of the small brick post office. She’d driven into town to pick up the mail and she had left the stack of letters and magazines on the front seat before starting her walk. Now she slid behind the wheel and drove slowly back through the quiet streets, feeling once again a sense of gratitude for the peace of this little town that had let her come home. It had been a long road home. As Susan passed the outskirts of town and turned onto the highway, she gained speed, making the asphalt and the white center stripe appear to be moving ever-faster backward beneath the wheels of her car. And as she watched the stripe, her thoughts turned to a quiet little girl — Edythe Marrener, nicknamed “Mousey” — sitting in the assembly hall of Girls Commercial High School in Brooklyn, listening to a lady giving a lecture. Through a monotony of speech the words incentive — drive — personality — lingered in the girl’s mind. While Edythe listened to the woman, her eyes rested on the mink coat that the speaker had carelessly tossed over the back of a chair on the stage. Then she looked down at her own faded, mended cotton dress; she owned just one other. And that afternoon she made a promise to herself: “Some day I’ll come back here and lecture to the girls, and I’ll be wearing furs, too.” She kept the promise. Years later she came back, wearing furs, and she lectured and signed autographs — “Susan Hayward.” She was now earning over $200,000 a year. As she guided the car along the highway out of the town of Carrolton, she found herself speaking the words, “You can get razzle-dazzle in Hollywood. You can get rich. And you can get smashed!” Here in the sunlight, among the peaceful hills of the Georgia countryside, it was hard to remember the night when her life seemed to lie in ruins. But as she turned off, onto the narrow, tree-shadowed road through the pine woods which led to her house, Susan’s mind went back to the night of April 25, 1955, in another house, in Sherman Oaks, California. . . . She was alone in the living room. As she watched the carved hands of the tall grandfather clock relentlessly slip away the minutes, her thoughts circled hopelessly. Her marriage had blown up the year before, blown up in a flare of headlines. Just four days earlier, she had reluctantly met with her ex-husband, who challenged her custody of their twin sons. As she sat on the couch, her head thrown back in utter exhaustion, she could hear his angry voice echoing in her ears. Nothing had been settled; she could forsee no end to the recriminations and quarrels. Timothy and Gregory were sleeping upstairs, yet at this moment they seemed very far away from her. Kept at the studio for a conference, she had come home after their bedtime and crept up to look in on them, just motionless forms outlined under the covers with only their heads peeping out. In the afternoon, when school was out, the house must have been filled with the shouts and laughter of two husky ten-year-olds. But she had not been there to hear them. Susan sighed. She looked up again at the clock. How the minutes were dragging. It seemed as though the night would never end. Already she had tried to go to sleep — but sleep would not come. So she had gotten out of bed to come and sit on the couch. Beside her lay the script of “I’ll Cry Tomorrow.” She picked it up, glanced at a few pages, but could not concentrate. Her mind kept racing on, racing in circles, finding no way out of her personal trap. Her doctor had prescribed sleeping pills. They didn’t do any good. She was still awake, still sitting in her living room, in the dark, alone. She could feel no love around her, no promise of help from anywhere, no vision of morning light to come. Even now, driving along the winding road through the pine woods, Susan could not clearly bring her mind to remember the rest of that terrible night. She knew only what her mother had told her and what the newspapers had reported. In the small hours of the morning, Mrs. Ellen Marrener had been awakened in her own house by the ringing of the telephone. The voice over the wire, broken by sobs, said, “Don’t worry, Mother. You’ll be well taken care of.” Herself close to hysteria, Mrs. Marrener promptly called the police, saying, “My daughter! I’m afraid she’s going to commit suicide!” Speeding through the quiet streets, the squad car screeched to a halt at the house in Sherman Oaks. The policemen rushed across the patio and pounded on the nearest door. From within came a dim voice trying to shape the word “Yes,” but managing only “Yeh — yeh.” They broke through the door and found Susan Hayward lying unconscious on the floor of her living room. Looking down on her, its face blank and unpitying, the clock that had measured the slow minutes after midnight now showed four o’clock. In Susan’s bathroom cupboard upstairs, the police found two bottles of sleeping-tablets — empty. Susan was rushed to North Hollywood Hospital for emergency treatment, then transferred to Cedars of Lebanon. And there she returned fully to consciousness. The morning had come after all, she thought, its light reaching into the hospital room. She felt weak, but her thoughts were no longer whirling; her mind seemed relaxed and she lay there welcoming the sensation of being alive. Her mother and her brother, Walter, were waiting to see her. As they walked towards her bed she saw in their faces the love that for a few terrified moments, the night before, she had forgotten. And she felt a spiritual love. A few days after that, she said: “Don’t ever think for one instant in your life that God does not exist. He does. I know.” And she did know. Somehow she felt the other evening she had almost come face to face with Him. Rounding a curve, the car moved out of the shadows of the pine woods and into the afternoon sunlight. Ahead was home, hidden among the gentle hills. Then it came into view, a rambling stone hunting lodge with a white roof. In a way, it had grown out of two hearts, hers and her husband’s. Susan had pored over rough CATALOG Join the millions of families who shop and save by mail from this bright, colorful catalog. Select from thousands of newest styles and finest home items . . . all priced at America’s greatest savings and all guaranteed. Your* money back if you are not delighted. 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