When Opportunity Knocks
In this compelling tale of obsession and revenge, Margaret Stallings, a seemingly ordinary woman with an intense and manipulative personality, becomes the nightmare of renowned portrait artist Natalie Gurevitz. Margaret’s demand for an immediate portrait spirals into a chilling vendetta when Natalie refuses her commission. Determined to ruin the artist, Margaret unleashes a campaign of harassment and slander that escalates into terrifying real-world consequences. As Margaret's relentless pursuit threatens to destroy Natalie’s career and safety, the true extent of her malicious intent is revealed, turning what began as a simple refusal into a harrowing battle against a dangerous foe.
This story was told to me by painter, Natalie Gurewitz. Any resemblance to living persons is totally fictional.
I don’t often get scared when I’m alone in my studio at night. I probably should be because it’s dark and a little creepy back there behind the house where the building is located. First, there are a myriad of trees and bushes for intruders to hide behind. And second, the noises: dogs barking like crazy along the fenceline as they go after rodents, the chirping of crickets, the soft thud of moths against the screen door, the crack crack crack of falling branches. But I am inured to these sounds. I turn the lights on full strength so the place is like a glowing road stop in the middle of a dense woods. The floor-to-ceiling windows have no coverings and are like framed areas of darkness, reflecting back only images of me in grubby studio clothing as I stand at my easel, inspecting the the day’s work. It would never occur to me to be frightened alone back there mainly because we’ve had absolutely no trouble before. That is, until now.
First let me say, I am expensive. My specialty is portraiture and the cost of a painting starts at twenty thousand dollars and is likely to go higher, depending on size and complexity. I only do about six canvases a year and I’m pretty choosy about clients. Most people wanting portraits find me through word-of-mouth, or magazines featuring my work. All this means is, I’m booked out far in advance.
One evening not long ago, I received a call from a woman named Margaret Stallings inquiring about the cost of a portrait.
When I asked how she’d found me, she said through friends and rattled off some names I didn’t recognize, which doesn’t mean much since names tend to blur in my artist’s brain.
The cost didn’t deter her. But she was pushy about scheduling the job. “I need this to be done right away,” she said. “I have a big event coming up and I want to be able to display the painting in the ballroom.” Her voice was deep and croaky and for a minute I thought she was a man impersonating a woman.
“Portraits take time,” I answered. “And there are a number of people ahead of you.”
“I need it quickly,” she repeated. “I’m willing to pay an extra five thousand dollars.”
“I’m sorry but it doesn’t work that way,” I told her.
There was a silence. Then: “You don’t understand. This is a matter of life or death. I need the portrait started now.”
Well, that aroused my curiosity. Who was this woman? I imagined her as a wealthy socialite used to getting her way because she had the money to push people around. But when she appeared at my front door for a consultation, I was a little surprised. She looked entirely ordinary, with short, curly, dyed black hair and a small, thin-built frame. She was so average and plain, she might have been a little brown wren perched on a telephone wire. But her personality was anything but ordinary. “So you’re the painter?” she said when she saw me. She eyed me up and down as if I weren’t the person she was expecting. “You don’t look like a painter,” she declared in her deep voice as we walked down the path to the studio.
“What do you think a painter looks like?” I asked.
“I don’t know – someone larger than life with a bandana on their head.”
I thought that was kind of ironic since she didn’t look like a socialite any more than I looked like her version of a painter, whatever that was. (I’m a skinny white-haired woman who goes around in jeans and T-shirts and large horn-rimmed glasses.)
In the studio, Margaret’s dark blue eyes darted around like little arrows as she inspected the place. My current portrait was turned with its back to the room, my usual practice, and when Margaret tried to turn it around, I aggressively stopped her. “Don’t touch that!” I cried, stepping between her and the painting.
“Why not?” said Margaret.
“Because I told you not to.”
“Is it a secret?” she asked somewhat slyly.
“I never let people see work until it’s finished.”
Margaret’s dark blue eyes grew scornful. “That’s a pity. I’d think you’d be proud of your paintings and want to show people examples.”
She continued to walk around my studio, scrutinizing everything there was to see – buckets of brushes, pallet knives, pencils, sponges, markers, racks of paint. She studied the door leading out to a small deck lined with potted plants, and gazed at the shelves above my work table that house my altar – a round golden Buddha, a quaint menorah, several boxes containing ashes of departed pets and relatives, and some fat chunks of amber my mother had given me years before. “What’s in those boxes?” Margaret asked, nodding her chin toward the altar.
“My mother’s ashes plus the ashes of various pets.”
“Oh my god!” she cried. “Your mother’s ashes shouldn’t be in such a dirty place!”
I decided to ignore that, but found myself disliking her more and more.
“So when can you start my portrait?” she asked. She edged up close to me, our bodies practically touching. “Like I said, I can pay five thousand dollars over the asking price.”
“It doesn’t matter what you pay,” I said, backing up a little. “I already have portraits promised to a number of people ahead of you.”
“Well, so what? This is important. Surely you can fit me in before the next person?”
“I’m sorry. I can’t do that.”
“You’re that scrupulous? Good god, how do you function in this world?”
“By sticking to my word,” I said.
She paused a second, squinting her eyes at me. Then she croaked, “That’s stupid. I was taught that when opportunity knocks, you’d better open the door.”
“I’m afraid I was taught differently.”
“Then you’re a fool. You should grab gifts when they’re offered to you. Didn’t your mother teach you that?”
“You could try a different painter,” I suggested.
“I don’t want another painter. I want you!”
“Well, then you’ll have to wait,” I said, opening the studio door to indicate it was time for her to leave.
“You’re gonna be sorry for this!” she said, nearly shouting. “If you won’t paint my portrait right away, I’ll make sure no one else hires you. Just wait and see!”
“You do that,” I said sharply. All I wanted at that moment was to get rid of her.
I’m a fairly well-known painter. Although I dislike being in the public eye, I’ve been featured in quite a number of magazines, and interviewed on various podcasts. My style is a mix of realistic and quirky, and my paintings are easily recognizable.
“Oh, that’s a Gurevitz,” people comment when they see my work in a group show, and if I’m within earshot my cheeks begin to burn and I start blushing insanely, unable to connect with the idea that I’m an artist people know anything about. I suppose Margaret had somehow found me in one of the magazines. I doubt we know anyone in common.
For the next few days, I couldn’t get my mind off Margaret, so plain and dreary in looks, but so demanding and difficult in personality. She was a woman I never wanted to see or be around again, and luckily I didn't have to.
And yet the next week, crazily, I ran into her at one of my favorite Austin restaurants, Jeffrey’s, a plush and expensive place we go to for special occasions. We, my husband, Richard and I, were celebrating our thirty-eighth wedding anniversary. We ordered champagne cocktails, wine, filet of sole and a chocolate mousse for dessert. A waiter brought us their signature rolls – popovers – and I was just buttering mine when I noticed a woman enter the room and make her way to the bar. She was wearing a slinky black dress and gold jewelry and her mouth was painted a bright red that brought life and vitality to an otherwise uninteresting face. It took me a moment to realize she was Margaret. I ducked my head, not wanting her to see me. My own face is high-cheek-boned and angular, not an easy one to miss. I tried to hide myself behind the menu and then leaned down to study my phone, clicking on it as if I were responding to important messages. I hadn’t told Richard about my experience with Margaret, and had to whisper to him about what had happened.
“Why would you worry about her?” he asked. “You don’t owe her anything, so why would you care?”
“Because I think she’s vicious and could cause trouble.”
“Like what? She looks pretty harmless to me.”
Richard, an old prep school boy who comes from a family of wealth, is a professor of medieval history at the University of Texas. His head tends to be in the clouds.
“Like spreading bad rumors about me,” I said.
“Well, so what? You’re well-known and your work is in demand. I don’t think you have anything to worry about.”
I decided to drop the matter. Up at the bar, Margaret sat with her legs twisted around the stool. She wore black designer sandals and a pretty, diamond-encrusted comb to hold back her curly hair. She actually looked very good, and with her expensive dress and a slim gold bangle around her wrist, I could imagine her as the socialite she claimed to be. I was expecting someone to join her, but after two cocktails (and a lot of time on the phone) she wiped her mouth, re-applied her lipstick and slid off her stool. I ducked my head again so she wouldn’t see me, but she spotted me anyway and paused at our table. “So this is the husband,” she said in her croaky voice.
I was forced to introduce them. Margaret smiled, showing small white teeth, and said, “You should tell your wife to break her rules and paint me right away.”
“Oh, I can’t tell her to do anything,” laughed Richard.
“Really? A husband should always be able to boss his wife around, otherwise he’ll be labeled a pussy.”
Richard is a tall man with a craggy face and shock of white hair. He looks nothing like a pussy and people are often intimidated by him. But Margaret wasn’t. She bent toward us a little drunkenly and asked if she could sit down. Richard was a good guy and pulled out a chair. Margaret lowered herself, slinky dress rising to well-toned mid-thigh, and immediately began talking.
“How old are you?” she asked Richard.
“Sixty-four, like the Beatles song.”
“Really? You don’t look it. You’re a very distinguished-looking man.”
Richard is a sucker for praise. He hummed in appreciation.
“Have you been married before?” she asked him.
“Nope. One wife is enough.”
“I’ve been married seven times. The last one was a dud, but I stayed with him because he was funny and kept me entertained.”
“Maybe you shouldn't have left him,” Richard said drily.
“Hell no!” croaked Margaret. “He didn’t have any money and I was the one who had to pay all the bills.”
“Why’d you marry him in the first place?” I asked.
“He was handsome – the kind of guy women like to take care of.”
I couldn’t imagine Margaret taking care of anyone but herself. And I certainly couldn’t imagine being married seven (!) times, but decided not to go there.
“What do you do professionally?” I asked instead, wondering if she’d ever had a job.
She brushed her lips with a napkin, though she hadn’t eaten anything. “I worked in travel for a while. Then I took a position at the university as an events coordinator. I didn’t really have to work, but I wanted to for the fun of it.” She gave a little burp, which she tried to hide behind her hand. Then she said, “Hey, could you order me a chicken salad sandwich, please? And maybe another glass of wine?”
I tried to kick Richard under the table to remind him we were celebrating an anniversary, but he ignored me, apparently fascinated by this strange little woman with her raspy voice and the diamond comb in her hair. He gestured to the waiter, who rushed over instantly, and said: “This lady would like a chicken sandwich and a glass of merlot.”
Margaret rewarded him with a wide (and very charming) smile. “I love men who are tall, like you,” she said, her croaky voice suddenly kind of sexy.
“Oh yeah?” said Richard. A sparkle appeared in his usually grave brown eyes. “I think a lot of petite women like bigger men. Makes them feel protected.”
Yuk! Vomit! I could have happily strangled him right then.
“And yet you married a tall woman,” Margaret said, glancing at me and then at Richard. “Tell me, professor, what made you interested in medieval history of all things?”
The sparkle in Richard’s eyes deepened. “Goodness! That’s a big question,” he said.
“I have time,” said Margaret, planting her little hands on the white cloth.
“Actually, we’re having a private celebration here,” I said, trying to keep my voice pleasant.
“Oh really?” croaked Margaret. “I’m so sorry. Richard invited me to sit down so I thought …”
Margaret’s sandwich arrived just then (we’d already progressed to postprandial coffee) and there was a silence as the waiter set the plate down in front of her. She ate delicately, patting the napkin to her lips, licking at her fingers when she finished. Richard paid the bill (including hers) and we all got up to leave. “See you soon,” Margaret said, waving at us, gold bangle gleaming in the light of passing headlamps.
I had no plan to see her “soon” or ever again, but the next day she called me, saying she’d lost an earring and had I perhaps found it in my studio?
“No,” I said cooly, wondering why she hadn’t called about the earring sooner.
“Well, I’m sure it’s there. That’s the last place I was before noticing it was missing.”
“You must have lost it somewhere else,” I said. “I’m very organized and I would have noticed it if it were there.”
“It’s a diamond drop, quite big and expensive. I’m coming over straight away to look for it.”
“That’s not convenient,” I said. “I’m about to leave for a meeting with a client.”
That was a lie, but I didn’t want Margaret in my studio again. Just the thought of her made me queasy. Besides, I had no memory of her wearing important earrings – just plain gold hoops, if anything.
“Cancel the meeting. This is more important,” she snapped.
“I can’t do that. But I promise I’ll look everywhere for the earring and get back to you.” I hung up before she could say anything else.
I did search the studio, but not until I’d finished work for the day and perhaps not as hastily as Margaret would have liked. There wasn’t a single sign of the earring. Every surface was bare, save for my phone and glasses and the packs of gum I keep around for when I want a cigarette – a habit I’m continually fighting. I even got on all fours and searched all the areas an earring might have fallen, but came up empty. I was extremely puzzled, first because I hadn’t noticed valuable earrings on Margaret (just those little hoops), and second because nothing like this had ever happened before. My studio is cleanswept and tidy. A diamond earring would have jumped out like a hole in the front of an elegant dress, unless, perhaps, it had somehow managed to fall in a crack, but that was unlikely; the floor was linoleum, no cracks, and even with the skylight and tall windows, the studio was designed to be energy efficient, tight as a box.
I considered the possibility that Margaret might be lying, but to what purpose? I couldn't imagine her being that bitchy or crazy, even if she did have a difficult personality.
So I didn’t bother to call her back. A day later, two cops arrived at my door. “We’ve received a complaint about you,” one of them said.
“What sort of complaint?”
“That you have in your possession an important piece of jewelry that doesn’t belong to you. We’ll have to search your studio, Ma’am, to see if it’s there. According to the complainant, that’s the last place it was seen.”
“The complainant already called me about the earring. I’ve done a thorough search of the studio and didn’t find it anywhere.”
“We still have to conduct a search, Ma’am.”
I should have demanded a warrant. Instead, I watched unhappily as they took apart the studio, leaving it a total wreck just like in a movie showing the aftermath of an FBI search. Drawers were left open, an area of the linoleum was slit apart, all my paints were removed from their racks and thrown to the ground. They even dug into my potted plants on the back deck. When they told me they’d have to search the house, I told them to come back with a warrant.
At that point I called my lawyer.
“You can sue for defamation,” he told me after I’d recounted the whole story.
Shit! That was the last thing I wanted to do – go to court to get rid of this crazy bitch whose one purpose was to slander me. As she’d said, if I didn’t paint her, she’d make sure no one else would hire me. What was wrong with her?
My lawyer stepped in and was able, magically, to stop a search of my house … at least for the time being. But he couldn’t stop what happened next. When I opened my phone the morning after I’d talked to him, there were nasty remarks and rumors about me all over social media.
Natalie Gurevitz is a thief!
Natalie Gurevitz stole a precious diamond earring from a client!
Natalie Gurevitz, well-known portrait painter, is so bedazzled by beauty that she swiped a beautiful piece of jewelry from socialite Margaret Stallings.
How to stop this? The courts would take too long. Already I’d received a phone call from a would-be client. “Ms. Gurevitz? I’m sorry but I have to cancel my request for a portrait. There’s just too much bad stuff about you in the press.”
I couldn’t argue with that. Even my own friends were beginning to question me. Ariel Schwartz, whom I’d known for thirty years, called and said, “What the fuck is going on Natalie? Why are they saying you stole jewelry from a client?”
“It’s all bullshit. The woman wants revenge on me because I refused to paint her portrait.”
“Well, you’ve got to do something about it ASAP! People love dishing dirt. You’re gonna lose clients.”
“I already have,” I said miserably.
“You’ve gotta fight fire with fire, Natalie. Maybe quickly paint an ugly portrait of her and post it all over the place?”
I actually thought that was a good idea. But I’m a slow painter. A portrait takes weeks – too long to decimate the woman. I could quickly toss off a caricature of her, but that would only inflame her further, plus I didn’t want to waste the time. And yet …
And yet I lost a second client.
And then something truly terrible happened. I was already feeling jittery enough, but one night I woke from a deep, medicated sleep and thought I heard noises coming from the studio.
Footsteps, possibly. Or twigs breaking. There was enough distance between the house and studio to make this implausible, but I rushed from my bed, threw on some shoes and ran outside.
My plan was to grab my flashlight (which was in the studio) and check behind every bush and tree to see if someone was hiding in the darkness. Instead, I tripped over a rock I swear hadn’t been there before, and went flying. As I fell, I heard a twig break and sensed another person’s presence nearby. Whoever it was froze. Meanwhile, I was too badly hurt to move. I wanted to call Richard, asleep in the house, but didn’t have my cell phone with me.
“HELP!” I shrieked, but of course no one answered. “WHOEVER YOU ARE, PLEASE COME HELP ME!” I shrieked again, but still no answer, not even the tiniest of sounds. I’d fallen directly on my knees, and when I felt around, my hands came up sticky with blood. I leaned over and vomited. Then I must have blacked out.
The next thing I knew it was hours later. There was blood all over the place and I was freezing cold. One of my knees had been so badly sliced open that I could see bone. When I craned my neck and looked around, I noticed several biggish rocks that I didn’t remember ever having put there. So that was what I’d tripped over. I was in terrible pain, but didn’t have the voice to call for Richard again. If I opened my mouth, all that came out was a croak. So I lay there shivering, grinding my teeth in agony. I thought I would die. I tried to picture my children, but that didn’t help. I tried to picture my mother, long dead, but that didn’t help either. How could this happen in my own backyard? I imagined the headlines: ARTIST FOUND DEAD BEHIND HER HOUSE!
That sounded perfectly realistic. Perhaps birds would pick at me. Perhaps coyotes would jump the fence and devour me whole. My shivering increased, as if my body were some kind of machine gone crazy, thump thump thumping on the gravel. What should I do? By now, light was coming into the sky and I could assess the damage around me: blood and vomit, a scene of carnage.
It seemed like forever before I heard Richard’s voice calling. It wasn’t unusual for me to go to the studio early in the morning, so he probably didn’t realize anything was wrong. He appeared in Teva sandals, with a cup of coffee in his hands. The sight of my bloody body surrounded by gore must have been terribly shocking. He ran back into the house to call 911 and returned with a blanket; within seconds we heard sirens and then the EMTs were all over me.
I was in the hospital for two days after surgery on my knee and on my shocked, torn-up body. Thankfully, aside from the knee, I was intact. I would have to be in rehab for a while, and it would be at least a month before I could get back to work. Richard was a saint and hosed off the bloody mess in the studio yard. He was smart enough to take pictures of the site beforehand. While he was cleaning up, he noticed a small gold hoop half hidden in the dirt. He brought it inside for me to look at and I knew instantly that the earring was Margaret’s. So she was the one who’d moved the rocks around. And she was the one whose presence I’d sensed in the darkness.
“You can’t prove it,” Richard said. “That earring could belong to anyone, and she could have dropped it weeks ago when she visited your studio.”
“I know it’s hers,” I said through clenched teeth. “And I’m going to get back at her.”
“How exactly are you going to do that?”
I thought for a minute. Then I said: “By writing about it.”
“You’re not a great writer,” Richard pointed out.
That was true. The written word had never been my forte. My genius was putting paint on canvas. Even though I was a big reader, I’d never been good at assembling words on paper. “I’ll hire someone,” I said.
“Yeah, who?”
“I don’t know yet, but I’ll find someone.”
I spent the next few days thinking about who might be a possibility. Then a friend suggested a blogger whose specialty was researching public figures – such as Trump – and brutally eviscerating them. Immediately I knew that was who I wanted.
It took several days to contact this person, discuss with her what was going on and agree on a price. The story that you’re reading right now is the result. The writer changed names, of course, but I have to caution you:
If you know a dark-haired woman aged about sixty-five who claims she’s a wealthy socialite, who’s been married seven times, who’s a bit of a shapeshifter (can show up plain or gorgeous), and who might be interested in your wealthy husband, RUN THE OTHER WAY. She’s a thief who will do her best to ruin you.