Tim Wynne-Jones - The Uninvited

A boxy black Honda Element pulled out of the driveway a moment later, a large old desk strapped to the roof rack, its legs sticking up in the air like some dead animal. The back of the Honda looked to be jam-packed with furniture. Dr. Lou was sitting in the passenger seat, the other woman driving. They didn’t notice Cramer, either.

It was 7:00 PM. He was on his way to work. For the last couple days, he had taken the time to drive out of his way past the Page house. He was scoping the place out. He had done it before, after all. And tonight it looked as if he had caught a break. It wasn’t hard to guess where they were all heading. The round-trip to the snye would take them an hour at least and who knows how long to unload all the furniture. Plenty of time. Now all he needed was to talk himself into it.

Cramer looked ahead and behind him. Riverside Drive was deserted in both directions. It was a stretch of road with farmland to the north and large riverside properties to the south, properties that were wooded and landscaped, hedged and fenced. Private. Some of them even had gates. But not the Pages’. A lawn mower was making a racket nearby, but Cramer couldn’t see where. He skipped across the pavement and down the long, shaded drive without anyone seeing him.

ADVANCED ALARM. The little sticker in the corner of the glass-fronted door didn’t come as a complete surprise. Clearly, he wasn’t going to just walk in the door the way he had last fall.

He walked around the side of the house to the floor-length windows of the master bedroom. This was where he had found the emerald necklace. The curtains weren’t fully drawn. Pressing his nose up to the screen, he could dimly make out the dresser where Dr. Lou had kept her jewelry case. He had a penknife, never went anywhere without it; the mesh of the screen would be easy to slit. And then what? Break the glass? He quickly glanced behind him. He was alone. He turned his attention back to the window. It all depended on how the alarm system was activated: motion detector, pressure detector, or metal contacts on the window frames. Yes, there they were. But how long was this going to take? Would the siren be louder than the lawn mower? The alarm company would contact the local cops, but not before they phoned the residence to see if it was a false alarm. He sure didn’t plan on dawdling and he wasn’t greedy. Shit! He hated this-just wanted it to be over!

He looked around for a rock, a stick. Nothing, just lawn. He backed off.

He’d had a plan. He’d seen other stuff when he stole the necklace: pearls, some silver earrings, whatever. Not much, but he was guessing it was good stuff. He didn’t know any fences to get rid of stolen merchandise; that was Waylin Pitney’s territory. But he figured Mavis could help him out. It was for her, after all. So she could dress up in something nice. She could still do that, when she took a mind to it. They would drive into Ottawa, go to a jewelry store or a pawnshop or something. She could pretend she was selling off a few family heirlooms. She could pull it off-he knew she could-if he could convince her. It was a big if, but then it was for her-for her art! And there was something else that might win her over. She hated Louise Page.

The lawn mower drew nearer. Cramer was standing a few yards away from a tall cedar fence. The lawn mower, by the sound of it, was right on the other side. The noise made him nervous. He wouldn’t hear a car arrive over that racket. What if they doubled back? What if they had forgotten something?

He folded up his knife. He pressed his nose up to the screen one last time, trying to make out the shine or glitter of something of value.

But then he saw Mavis in his mind’s eye-saw her face as he tried to explain his plan. He imagined her green eyes shifting away from the jewels he was holding out to her. Think of all the paint, think of all the canvas, he would say, trying not to raise his voice. He imagined her rubbing her hands together nervously, shaking her head. No.

Who was he kidding? He would have to sell the stuff himself, and there was no way he could do that. Stealing it was going to be way hard enough.

He glanced at his watch. He had twenty minutes to get to work, and only if he hightailed it. He took off across the lawn, angry now. He had three jobs: the plant, the store, and keeping his mother happy. It was one job too many.

The night-shift job was contract work. Cramer didn’t get benefits, but the pay was good. Sometimes he’d get laid off without any notice for a week or two, but he’d always get hired back. He was a good worker. Reliable.

Usually, he worked at PDQ Electronics two afternoons a week, but lately business had been booming. He had been an intern there in high school, and Hank Pretty, who owned the place, kept him on as an apprentice. Cramer was good with his hands and was computer savvy, but there had been no thought of going away to school, even though Hank urged him to go. Who’d look after Mavis?

She was on her feet again now, and that made things better. Cramer would get home from the plant around five in the morning, and sometimes she’d be up already, hard at work. The other morning she had even stopped and made him breakfast, sat and had coffee with him. Then he’d gone to bed, and the last thing he’d heard as he fell asleep was her humming along with cheery morning music on the radio as she painted away.

Right now she was painting over old canvases. She wasn’t complaining, not much, but he felt in his heart how hard it must be for her.

He was not a thief. He was not going to break into just anybody’s house. The Pages were different, the way he saw it. He had not stolen the emerald necklace; he had recovered it to its rightful owner.

“It was meant to be mine. Just look at it, Cramer, for heaven’s sake.”

And when he had finally held it in his hands, looked at it, up close, he had known that Mavis was right. The jewel was exactly the color of her eyes.

He had staked out the Page place for days before entering the house that crisp October afternoon. He had watched from the water, from the deep shade on the south shore of the Eden. Watched the comings and goings of Dr. Lou and her friend, when the cleaning lady came, the postman. That was when he had learned that Jay was back from out west. He followed him upriver and discovered the little house on McAdam’s Snye.

When he finally brought the necklace home and snapped the clasp of it at the nape of his mother’s neck and saw how happy she was, he ventured to tell her about the house on the snye. She had smiled the saddest smile he had ever seen, and tears had gathered in the corner of her eyes. She didn’t need to tell him why. The little house was where she and Marc Soto used to meet.

He knew the story. A love story. The story of an artist and his young and talented student-the most talented student he had ever come across. Mavis had turned the artist’s life upside down, made him leave his wife. But she had given him the courage, the inspiration to paint as he had never painted before. That’s what the artist had told her and that’s what she told Cramer. The story never changed, every time she told him. Sometimes he wanted to say to her, I’m a little old for fairy tales, but he didn’t dare.

The artist and his brilliant student would move to New York, according to the love story. He would go first and find them a place. She would follow. Except there was a glitch: by then she was pregnant. How proud Marc was, she told Cramer. How happy. But she mustn’t tell anyone who the father was, Marc warned her. It might get back to Louise, and there would be big trouble. Legal trouble. It could ruin everything. Oh, she understood. The last thing Mavis wanted was trouble, when she was this close to a dream come true.