Cary Grant - HAUNTED By His Past

THE HANDSOME AND CHARMING ACTOR SPENT DECADES RUNNING FROM HIS CHILDHOOD PAIN

- LOUISE A. BARILE

Cary Grant held on tightly to one cherished memory of his parents. "In our garden there were fuchsias, hollyhocks, geraniums and primroses," he said. "We often ate under the shade of our apple tree, particularly on summer Sundays....

Those, I now appreciate, were the happiest days for the three of us." Elias and Elsie Leach, a young couple in working-class Bristol, England, tried to give their only son, Archie, a good life, but poverty, grief and conflict tarnished their best intentions. The unexplained disappearance of Elsie when Archie was 9 left him with fears of abandonment. He blamed his father's alcoholism on a "slow-breaking heart, brought about by an inability to alter the circumstances of his life." The boy would not discover all of his family's dark secrets until he was a Hollywood star.

Cary once tried to make sense of his phobias and preferences for a reporter. He explained that the swing his father hung for him from the apple tree caused his fear of height. His dislike of Bristol's cold winters made him try "to spend every possible moment where the sun shines warmest." Cary's lack of a formal education gave him an insatiable thirst for knowledge and self-improvement.

"I have spent the greater part of my life fluctuating between Archie Leach and Cary Grant; unsure of either, suspecting each," he admitted.

FAMILY SECRETS