I lost Faith and I wanted to die

On Monday, it will be the first anniversary of Adam Faith's death from a heart attack. His remarkable widow Jackie is now broke, homeless and living temporarily in Blackpool.

However, on Monday she'll be in London with her daughter Katya.

'As long as Kat and I are with each other,' she says, 'we'll be all right.' There will be tears, laughter and a lot of hugging as they grieve for the charismatic, irresistible man who adored them both. Fame never made him grand or remote, and though Adam was his stage name, he remained Terry to those who loved him.

'I was going to have a memorial service on Tuesday, but that's supposed to be a celebration of somebody's life and I still can't celebrate. It would have been another funeral for me.

'I'm not ready to smile, and it's no use pretending. In the beginning, I couldn't bear to look at couples because I felt so jealous.' She and Katya are both indomitable women but it's been a terrible year. When Terry died, he was bankrupt, and he and Jackie were living in a rented, five-bedroom farmhouse in the pretty village of Tudeley in Kent.

'I couldn't afford to stay, but I didn't want to. All the time I was there, I kept expecting him to walk through the door saying: "Hi, Jack."

'I hated going back to London, because wherever I went I'd see a house where we'd lived or restaurants we visited. I was just consumed with the thought that he'd gone. I longed to feel normal.

'Wherever I was, I wanted to be somewhere else. There was no peace anywhere.

I'd pack a bag and go off to stay with somebody, and as soon as I got there I wanted to leave.

'I still feel disoriented. It would have been a relief to die, but I wasn't brave enough to kill myself and I wouldn't do that to Kat. She was our life and Terry would have been so angry if I'd even contemplated it. He'd have said: "Come on, girl, pull yourself together."

'I went through the motions of living - showering, eating - but I was a zombie. It was just my body doing it. It was like living in a black hole, and at times it felt easier to stay there, to cry and live in the past, rather than fight.' Jackie has lost not only her beloved husband but her house, her furniture, paintings and memorabilia. It's all in store and she can't touch anything.

However, she still has to pay the storage costs while insolvency officials battle over her assets.

'They're employed by the bank to get back as much money as they can. I think they suspected we had yachts or off shore accounts, but we didn't.

Meanwhile, my whole life is in 17 containers.

'They want me to sell everything and give them half the money. I'm refusing to do that and I'll go to court first.

'They didn't try to do that to Terry when he was alive, so why are they trying to do it now? There are pieces of furniture that Terry gave to me, but they won't accept I own them without a receipt.

'Last November, the valuers asked to see what is in store. They opened up everything, even a box of old Christmas decorations and Kat's christening robe.

There was a memory to everything - I thought: "That's my life there. If only I could have some of those things around me."

Her grief is palpable, and she often cries during the interview but quickly tries to smile.

Terry died in Stoke-on-Trent during a tour of the play Love And Marriage, when, true to form, he was with a young girl friend, 23-year-old Tanya Arpino.

She sold her version of their relationship to a newspaper and Jackie was devastated.

'She wasn't the first, and she wouldn't have been the last. But because he was dead, she exaggerated her part in his life.

'She was a fan and he used her.

She worked in our local restaurant, which is how we met her, and she'd been to the house. She was entranced by our whole lifestyle. She wanted to be me.

She's not evil. She's just a not very bright, silly girl.

'I said to him: "What are you doing with her?" and he said: "Nothing." She didn't matter to him. But because she was there when he died, she ended up seeming more important than she was.

'He used her as a goafer. He couldn't afford a chauffeur so he'd get her to drive him. Terry didn't like being alone. He wanted to get rid of her, but he felt sorry for her and said she was very fragile.

'He loved women. He'd chat up anybody, even when I was there.

He had phone numbers all over the place, but none of it interfered with our relationship.

'If you live with somebody who is fantastic, unique, vibrant, they're going to have a flaw - and you go along with it. You don't throw all that away for some unimportant girl.

He wanted to be 18 again and he always said to me: "It's not you, it's me."

I never doubted his love for me. The three of us were so confident of each other's love. Nothing ever entered that triangle and I knew he'd never leave me.

'Katya used to say: "I hope Daddy dies before you, because he'd go to pieces without you."

'We never judged each other. I did have one affair myself but he never knew. A friend said: "Do you want to leave Terry?' and I said "No." '

After the final show of Love And Marriage on Saturday, March 8, 2003, Terry went back to his hotel room. Tanya was there when he began to gasp for breath and his face turned blue. The young girl phoned reception and an ambulance was called. Terry was taken to hospital but died within hours.

When Tanya called Terry's agent from the hospital, he told her to leave immediately so that Jackie wouldn't know. In fact, she already knew but didn't feel threatened in any way.

'Tanya led people to believe that Terry died making love to her, which is totally untrue.

Because of his condition and the tablets he was taking, it had been impossible for a couple of years.

He'd have been devastated at what she did. Tanya still has the silver box where Terry kept his pills. It wasn't hers to take and I would like it back for Kat.

'Somebody who wasn't part of my husband's life has been able to undermine mine and Katya's world. She's done so much damage. She's a bunny boiler and I don't know how she can live with herself. She told so many lies which have now become gospel.

'For a near stranger to talk about me in such intimate terms was appalling.

We'd always been very private, always kept Terry's public life separate. But one stupid little girl, for money or fame or both, destroyed that.

'Kat and I mind so deeply that she ruined everything we'd worked for. People loved Terry and he did so much for charity even when he was ill. But after Tanya sold her story, everyone thought of him as an old chap with a young girl.

'It's what she's done to his memory that hurts. She betrayed him. The Heart Foundation had been considering creating a charity combined with a memorial in his name, but after that they dropped the idea.'

Most of Jackie's clothes are in packing cases and she's had to cope not only with grief but poverty.

'Terry left a small insurance policy but they've impoundedthat so I can't touch it.' They once lived in a wonderful moated house which Terry bought from film tycoon John Davis. Now Jackie is virtually a nomad, staying with different friends in turn.

Terry's Money Channel TV venture crashed in May 2001 and he was made bankrupt, owing Pounds 1.2 million to the bank.

'He'd been in the same position before and he'd come through. I was never frightened because he always bounced back. But this time the bank pulled the plug, which was a terrible shock. The channel was only months away from taking off and his share would have been worth £32million.'

Jackie and her famous husband were once property tycoons, living in a series of glamorous mansions with a cook and a butler. Now she doesn't know what the future holds - but she's a survivor.

Born into a working class family in Manchester, at 15 she was dancing in the chorus in pantomime with Bob Monkhouse and Danny La Rue.

At the moment, she's staying temporarily with Ian Hodgson, who runs a kennels in Blackpool and has been a family friend for over 30 years. They met when Terry brought two Afghan hounds from the kennels. After his death, it was decided that Jackie would stay with him.

'I said to Ian: "I've got nowhere to go - I'll be coming to stay with you for a while." I just brought my bed, dressing table and linen, feminine things and a few candles.

'Ian is very kind and sweet, but I'm a guest and I'm very conscious of whether or not I'm doing the right thing. I was always the one in control of our houses, but now I don't make any decisions.' At 61, Jackie is still stunning, with wonderful cheekbones and the taut elegant figure of a dancer.

Remarkably, she has no bitterness or apparent fear for the future. Her grief has been so allconsuming that it seems to have negated all other emotions.

Undeniably, the Blackpool house has been a refuge. 'Terry and I used to come and stay here. It was going up those stairs in this house that my waters broke and I lost my first baby. They got me into hospital and I presumed everything was going to be all right. My pains started and my son was born, but he only lived for an hour.' She also miscarried twins, but in 1970 Katya was born. Terry adored his feisty daughter, who is now a freelance television director.

He and Jackie met in Blackpool after a Sunday concert when she was Cliff Richard's girlfriend. In fact, Cliff once told me Jackie was the only girl he'd ever wanted to marry.

A few months later, she and Terry were on the same variety show together and he asked her out.

They were married for 36 tumultuous years, and though he was a natural philanderer, he never stopped loving her.

When I interviewed him in 1996, they were briefly separated but he talked of his wife with love, respect and almost reverence.

'Me living on my own,' he said, 'has nothing to do with Jackie. It's because I'm 56 and I'm going through the male menopause. I'm a f****** idiot.

'I live in London and Jackie lives in the country. I don't know if she's angry with me - nobody will ever know except her. She's a beautiful, strong, exceptional woman.' Despite living apart, they talked every day on the telephone, had holidays together and always spent Christmas with Katya.

Finally, he returned home for good, but even then he couldn't curb his nature.

'I like being in love,' he told me.

'There's no other reason for being on earth.' At 19, he was a famous pop star and he'd get his manager to invite fanciable girls he'd spotted in the audience to his dressing room. His sexual conquests were legendary, and after he married he had a two-year affair with tennis star Chrissie Evert.

When their relationship became public, she wanted him to leave Jackie.

However, Terry flatly refused and a heartbroken Chrissie phoned their home and spoke to Katya. 'Terry would never normally give a woman our home telephone number and that frightened me. I thought: "This must be serious."

'I went ballistic that she had the audacity to phone my house. It's a despicable thing to do to another woman. Then Terry arrived home and he knew the minute he walked though the door.

I tore into him, I smashed all our figurines and shouted: "You rat."

A friend of ours was there and he said to Terry: "Go to the end of the drive, ring Chrissie on your mobile and tell her never, ever to phone this house again." ' In 1986, Terry underwent bypass surgery and in 1973 he was terribly injured in an horrific car crash.

When her husband died, Jackie was staying in Spain with their old cook Angelina. She and her husband Vincente had both worked for Terry since he first became famous.

'Vincente died, but I'd go over and stay with Angelina. She was folding my clothes like I'd seen her do a million times when Kat rang.

'I said: "Hello my darling, how lovely to hear you - why are you ringing so early?"

She said: "Mum, it's Daddy." I said: "Is he ill?" She said: "He's dead."

'I threw the phone down - I couldn't speak - and Angelina was in tears. I flew back to Manchester because Terry was still in Stoke-on-Trent and my family live in the North.

I'm an only child but my mother had eight sisters and two brothers.

'I got to the airport and there was a sea of faces - Kat was waiting and my cousins. Their children had made paper flowers for Uncle Terry to take to the angels.

'Then I went to see him. I didn't know whether it was day or night. I said: "How could you leave me?

You'll never realise what we had, how much I loved you."' Terry was cremated and Jackie keeps his ashes in her Blackpool bedroom and takes them with her wherever she goes. 'I talk to him but he doesn't answer. When I die, I'm going to be cremated and then our ashes can be mingled.

'I tried to do what he'd have wished for the funeral. He wasn't religious and I wanted to burn him in the garden, but you're not allowed to do that.

'I had a Humanist funeral because you can't suddenly become religious on your deathbed-Kat wrote the script and I dressed him in a black polo neck and jeans. I put chocolates, a copy of The Little Prince and gardenias and stephanotis in the wicker coffin, because he loved them.

'At the end, I asked everyone to leave first so that Kat and I could have a few final moments.' Jackie wore a wonderful Armani suit and looked her usual, elegant self because she knew that it would have mattered to Terry.

Afterwards, she went around talking to everyone, making sure they were all right. When it was over, she went back to her house and began to pack up her home and her life.

Today, there isn't an ounce of self pity. The worst thing that could possibly happen to her in the world has already taken place. Somehow, she'll take on the bank, the insurers and battle through - because that's what her husband would have expected.

I ask her if she would ever consider marrying again and she says: 'I'm not interested. I don't have that kind of need. I was married to a wonderful, fantastic person. I never want anyone else.'