Alone Together: My Life With J. Paul Getty
Page 34
Upon arriving at Sutton Place, Paul’s butler, Bulimore, opened the door, and there stood Paul. I walked right into his arms and he kissed me, then embraced Nancy and, smiling, took the hands of each girl as they curtsied, and said, “I’m so happy you are all here. Barbara will show you to your rooms. And now, if you’ll excuse us, Teddy, come with me.” And taking my hand, we walked up the staircase to the second floor, down the long hall to his suite, through his bedroom, into his bathroom and stopping before a marble washstand, where Paul surprised me by getting down on his knees.
“Paul, what are you doing?” I asked.
“I have a surprise for you.” And with that, he opened the drawer and pulled out a rather faded little Donald Duck. Yes, the Donald Duck—the one I’d given him in 1935, the year we met.
Handing him to me, he smiled and said, “Look, Teddy Boo, I’ve kept him all these years, but he now desperately needs your help.” It was then that I saw the red crayoned heart I’d drawn on Donald’s rear end had faded, he needed mending, and his shoelaces had come undone. It brought tears to my eyes. I looked at Paul deeply, and said, “I still have mine!”
“Well then, if you will, I’ll ask Mrs. Bannerman, our housekeeper, to lend you her sewing kit and you can sew up my Donald before you leave.” And that’s exactly what I did.
We sat out in the garden one afternoon. I repaired Donald, and Paul sat beside me, reminiscing about our life at the beach house. He spoke of the walks we’d take with Timmy and the dogs, Hildy and Jocko, up the beach to the pier and back—stopping to watch those mad little sandpipers as they raced one another in and out of the waves barely missing being swept out to sea; and just as the sun disappeared beyond the horizon leaving a red golden sky, flocks of seagulls could be seen heading for the hills to roost each night.
When Paul passed away the following year, on June 6, 1976, I received a small box from England with Donald Duck carefully wrapped up inside—and outside, there hung a name tag marked For Teddy.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Special thanks go to my brother Ware, who inspired me as a kid to sing; my two sisters, Nancy and Bobby; my dear sweet mother; J. Paul Getty, who taught me to keep going no matter how difficult the going was; Dan Halpern, who had the courage to sign a woman of ninety-eight to a book deal!; Digby Diehl, for working with me; Hilary Redmon, a great editor who knows how to cut and not lose me; Richard Currier, for had he not been by my side holding my hand these past four years, I might not have finished the book; Robert Hill; Tom Hopke; Carol Carter; my friend Carola Stoner, a great spirit who helped me find Dan; Anne Getty; Kay Diehl; Sophie B. Hawkins; my dear nurses Mary, Maggie, and Nan; my teachers Blanche Marchesi, Sara Cahier, and Julio Moreski; the spirited Colleen Camp; and my lifelong friends Jean Donnley, Jean Pochna, Ethi Junger, Betzi Beaton, Jean Appleton, Kostya, Norene Nash, Beverly Petal, Leslie Sank, Valorie Gross, Dorothy Roeder, and Deborah Haase; and my ex-husband William Gaston, who introduced me to blue jeans, sailboats, and Maine.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
THEODORA “TEDDY” GETTY GASTON, born in Chicago in 1913, began singing at the age of sixteen in the chorus of J. J. Shubert’s Arms and the Maid and, in the twenties, performed as a torch singer in New York’s most prestigious supper clubs. She studied opera in Europe and worked for the New York Herald Tribune during World War II. After a long romance, she married J. Paul Getty, with whom she had one child. During their eighteen-year marriage, Teddy acted in Forgotten Women and Billy Wilder’s The Lost Weekend, and she started a water company, a candy company, and a children’s charity in her son’s name. In 1990, she wrote her frst book, The Mark of the Eagle.
DIGBY DIEHL is one of the most trusted and successful literary collaborators in America. He has written, cowritten, rewritten, researched, and edited more than three dozen books. He was the founding editor of the original Los Angeles Times Book Review and previously served as a book columnist for AARP The Magazine and as a literary correspondent for ABC’s Good Morning America. Diehl is currently the book editor of The Rotarian and writes articles and reviews for publications such as Esquire, the New York Times, People, and TV Guide. He lives in Pasadena with his wife, Kay Beyer Diehl.
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CREDITS
Cover design by Allison Saltzman
Cover photograph courtesy of the author
Decorative border courtesy of CSA Images
COPYRIGHT
This is a work of nonfiction. The experiences detailed herein are all true and have been faithfully rendered as the author remembered them.
ALONE TOGETHER. Copyright © 2013 by Theodora Getty Gaston. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-221971-8
EPub Edition SEPTEMBER 2013 ISBN 9780062219732
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