“Will you come down and watch me on the set?” Faye turned to her with pleading eyes and she looked like a child to the older woman. But Harriet only smiled gently and shook her head.
“You know how I hate that place, Faye.”
“But I need you.” There was something lonely in Faye's eyes, it was the first time Harriet had seen it, and she patted her young friend's arm reassuringly.
“I need you too, as a friend. But you don't need my advice as an actress, Faye Price. You've got more talent than I ever had in my little finger. You're going to be just fine. I know it. And my being on the set would only distract you.” It was the first time in a long time that Faye had felt she needed moral support on the set, and she still felt shaky about it when she left Harriet in San Francisco, later than planned, and began her trip down the coast road to what the Hearsts modestly called their “Casa,” and all the way down, she found herself thinking of Harriet.
For some reason she herself didn't understand, she felt lonelier than she had in years. She found herself missing Harriet, her old home in Pennsylvania, her parents. For the first time in years, she felt as though there were something missing in her life, though she couldn't imagine what. She tried to tell herself that she was just nervous about the new part, but it was more than that. There was no man in her life just then, hadn't been in a long time, and Harriet was right, it was too bad she never did settle down, but with whom? She couldn't imagine a single face that appealed to her at the moment, there was no one she was anxious to see when she got home, and the revels at the Hearsts' estate seemed emptier than ever. There were dozens of guests, and as always, lots of amusing entertainers, but there suddenly seemed to be no substance to the life she led, or the people she knew and met. The only thing that made any sense was her work, and the two people she cared about most, Harriet Fielding, who lived five hundred miles away, and her agent, Abe Abramson.
In the end, after smiling interminably for days on end, it was a relief to head for Los Angeles. And when she arrived, she let herself in with her key and walked upstairs into the white splendor of her own bedroom, feeling happier than she had in weeks. It was wonderful to be home. It looked better to her than the Hearsts' grand estate, and she lay across the white fox throw with a happy grin, kicking off her shoes, staring up at the pretty little chandelier, and thinking with excitement of her new role. She felt good again. So what if there was no man in her life? She had her work, and it made her very, very happy.
For the next month, she studied night and day, learning every line in the script, hers and everyone else's as well. She tried out different nuances, spent entire days walking the grounds of her home, talking to herself, trying it out, becoming the woman that she was to play. In the movie, she would be driven mad by the man she had married. Eventually, he would take their child from her, and she would attempt to kill herself, and then him, and slowly, slowly she would realize what he had done to her. She would prove it in the end, retrieve the child, and finally kill him. But even that final act of violence and vengeance was desperately important to Faye. Would the audience lose sympathy with her then? Would they love her more? Would they care? Would she win their hearts? It meant everything to her. And on the morning that filming was to begin, Faye was at the studio right on time, the script in a red alligator briefcase she always carried with her, her own makeup case made to match, a suitcase filled with a few things she always liked to have on the set, and she moved into her dressing room in a quiet businesslike way that was a delight to some, and enraged those who could not compete with her. Above all, and beyond anything, Faye Price was a professional, and she was also a perfectionist. But she demanded nothing from