Sometimes Helen marveled that such a news organization still existed, that the upper classes couldn’t censor the entire internet yet. Maybe the Entitled didn’t care what the rabble told each other. Words were cheap.
Out of curiosity, she checked establishment media. Not a word about her.
It didn’t matter. She was speaking directly to the rabble. They were her people.
In fact, it occurred to her, she ought to speak to her people even more directly.
Helen didn’t have any online profiles. She just didn’t care for anything especially technical. But the Robin Hood Thief ought to have a profile somewhere so she could broadcast her messages for herself.
Helen went to a public library so that the cops couldn’t track her new profile back to her or Mandy. She went onto a website called Whatsit and created a profile with the combined image from the news. Then she added a brief message in the bio:
[ Hello world. I’m the official Robin Hood Thief. Pleased to meet you. Feel free to chat with me here. ]
Then, with a mischievous grin, she set up her default configuration to paywall anyone whose demographic information showed they made more than fifty thousand dollars a year. If they wanted to see her content badly enough, they could pay a thousand dollars per view. She would accept those payments with one of her anonymous cash cards.
She also blocked wealthy users from augmenting her content, boosting it, or projecting it into the 3D landscape (or 3’scape) via Earworm, because those were ways a wealthy user could share her content with their ilk without having them pass through the paywall she’d just set up.
Her first post was the declaration, “No one deserves luxury while others still suffer.” She layered the text over a photo of an anonymous homeless person sleeping in a doorway. Then she authorized Whatsit to charge her twenty bucks to boost it exclusively to her kind of people for the next twenty-four hours.
That task complete, Helen stopped at the weapons store to get a thigh strap that would hold the Taser, and she put her mini canister of mace into the pocket of her jacket so her bag would be free of weapons in case they checked it at the door at her next robbery.
Next, Helen went to the pawn shop again. All this new visibility was making her nervous, and she went to Egemon to ask for a way to get fake IDs. She requested four new alternate selves, each accompanied by dramatic new disguises—and brown or black eyes. She supplied the photos, and as usual, he was quite capable of making the rest happen. “You’ll be able to download them in a few hours,” he said. “Oh, and don’t forget I owe you for the bail money.”
“No chance of that,” she said with a smile.
He turned and ducked back into the back room—then, just as quickly, he seemed to reconsider. Wordless and with a look she wasn’t sure she understood, he came back. He lifted the section of counter that created a walkway and gestured for her to follow.
She sensed that this was a rare privilege, and it made her smile.
Once in the cluttered, dusty back room, he simply said, “Open”—probably to his Earworm—and part of the back wall slid away, revealing a small room bursting with weapons and gadgets.
He went to a drawer and took out a cash card, then programmed it with a special-purpose e-paper in the small room.
In one corner of the ordinary part of the back area, Helen noticed a collection of singular children’s toys from bygone ages. Hand-carved rocking horses and ornate dollhouses, porcelain dolls in gauzy dresses, metal fire trucks. They were beautiful, and their presence here surprised Helen.
She nodded toward the items. “Inventory waiting to be sold?”
Egemon shuffled his feet. “Sort of.” His eyes softened as he looked at the toys.
“Sort of?” Helen sensed that these were special, and she couldn’t resist teasing him a little.
He shrugged and escorted her back to the front, his posture open and relaxed. “Here’s your money, with my thanks. And no charge for the IDs.” He handed her the card, accompanied by a smile.
Helen smiled in gratitude, but she couldn’t forget about the contents of the other room. She studied his face, looking for any clues. “Okay, what’s the story with the toys? Come on… you can’t let me see and then not tell me about it.”
He planted his palms on the counter and gave her an appraising look. When he spoke, it was with the air of confession. “Maybe someday I can open an antique toy store. Okay? I like old toys.”
Helen felt a smile break across her face. “Okay, but why? What’s the story?”
Egemon let out a gust of a sigh, looking at the counter for a moment. When he looked at her again, his dark eyes were liquid, and his tone soft but reluctant. “There was an old woman, a neighbor of mine I knew a short while. The toys were hers. She called me her grandson, and she left them to me. But don’t go and tell people that. They will think I’m soft.”
Helen grinned wickedly. “Your secret is safe with me. I promise.”
As she pushed the door open, causing the bell to jingle, he gave her an odd sort of salute and a charming smile and said, “Same to you, Ms. Robin Hood.”
For an instant, she paused, surprised that he had already guessed who she was, and uncertain as to what it meant. But looking carefully at the Greek man with his hands on the counter, she saw no threat there.
Not an enemy… an ally.
She grinned at him. “Good to know.”
He winked at her, and she smiled all the way out to her car.
It was a Thursday evening—an unusual night for a party, but apparently Mr. Brock Tolbrook, her next victim, didn’t want to waste a weekend evening on a minor political event. He was hosting a fundraiser for someone else’s city council campaign—no doubt some tit for tat.
For that night’s robbery, Helen used her usual methods to approach a gentleman who was entering alone, then introduced herself as one of her new fake identities and teasingly chastised the gentleman for not remembering her.
It still surprised her that this worked every single time, but then again, it was only good manners on their part. It wouldn’t do to tell someone to buzz off just because you didn’t recognize her.
Well, as long as she appeared to match your social class and status, of course. As long as she was “one of us.”
Luckily, looking the part was all that was necessary so far.
As Helen’s spot in line moved closer to the door, she eyed the security guard checking names. He nodded and spoke to the next guest, a woman a few people ahead of Helen. The woman fished in her purse and brought out her e-paper, which she unfolded and held out for the guard. Probably she was showing her ID.
Helen’s heart leapt into her throat, and her chest hollowed out. She felt her smile turn into a grimace. She struggled to think of some plausible reason not to show her fake ID, but suddenly it was her turn and she’d come up with nothing.
The guard apologized and gave her ID only a cursory look. However, he looked directly into her face with such scrutiny that it nearly stopped her heart. Her broad grin felt pasted-on. Surely he would recognize its insincerity. But he smiled politely and wished her a good evening.
She stepped into the party with legs weak from relief.
Soon, she stepped out of the ballroom to start casing the house. The first area, still in earshot of the party, was a wide hallway reaching toward the rest of the house. It was filled with a wide assortment of large art pieces depicting horses and dogs. Around those were dozens of thank-you letters and certificates of appreciation and photos of admirers with the owner of the house, Brock Tolbrook, who was a stocky middle-aged man with an oval face, short black hair that was receding, and a wide smile.
It looked like he had donated thousands of dollars to horse- and dog-related charities. She smiled as she read the words of gratitude for a “one-of-a-kind man, a true philanthropist, a benefactor beyond all others.”
He had a soft spot, she realized, for disabled animals—several of the horses in the photos were blind in on
e eye or missing an ear. There was even a large photo of him mucking out a barn stall wearing gloves and a wide grin. He was willing to rake out horse manure himself, and he wasn’t ashamed for people to see it. She found herself nodding in appreciation.
Maybe these people weren’t all bad, after all.
“He absolutely loves animals,” a genial voice said from near at hand.
Helen startled and looked around.
A soft, round woman in her early forties smiled kindly at her. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t meant to scare you. I just saw you admiring the charity collection and had to brag a little about my husband. I’m Mona.”
Mona extended a hand, and Helen shook it delicately. “Oh, that’s okay, Mona. Yes, I love to see people who care so much about the less fortunate.”
Helen realized too late that this quite an overstatement for the Entitled, but the other woman nodded as if it were gospel truth. “He’s like a doting mother when he’s with a wounded animal. I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name?”
Helen drew a blank for one horrifying moment, and then smoothly said, “Yvette Lane.”
“Ms. Lane, it’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance. How do you know my husband?”
Despite its gentle and sincere tone, the question threw another spike of fear through Helen. Her prepared back story was distant. She clawed it closer and managed to say, “Through the future councilman, Mr. Avery. My late husband worked with Mr. Avery on the board of education a number of years ago, before he retired.”
“Wonderful. Mr. Avery is a very generous man and a good choice for city council. His wife is lovely as well. I’ve been working with her on constructing a charity children’s hospital—it was all her idea.”
Helen’s internal reaction was at least half cynicism, but all that came out was, “That’s wonderful.” Her smile had grown tired, and she forced it to remain in place.
“Well, I do hope you’ve had a chance to enjoy the canapés and get yourself some wine?”
“Oh, yes, it’s been a lovely party. You have such an impressive home.”
Mona smiled charmingly. “Have a lovely evening, my dear.”
“You as well,” Helen said.
She watched Mona go, and then returned to staring at the pictures on the wall. Her fake smile sagged and she let out a breath she’d been holding. Mona and Brock seemed like decent people. For a moment, she felt bad about planning to steal from them. She reminded herself that she would be making a trivial dent in their vast net worth.
She looked around to make sure Mona had gone back to the party and that no one else was watching her. Then she wandered down a distant hallway, peeking in doors and avoiding two rooms with sentries.
She went around another turn and opened a door to see Brock Tolbrook going like a rabbit at a young woman who was bent over the back of a sofa.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Helen blurted out. Her face flushed and she made to back up and close the door.
Then she recognized the hideously obvious truth that the young woman bent over the sofa—who was now opening her mouth in a screech of horror—was not Tolbrook’s wife.
Helen suddenly liked Brock Tolbrook a good deal less than she had.
Tolbrook pulled away and scrambled to get his trousers up, cursing and red-faced. He was half a foot shorter than he looked in the portraits and photos outside.
The woman blasted him: “You didn’t lock the door?”
Helen felt her eyebrows colliding as she advanced on Tolbrook, unthinking, words coming out of her mouth. “Your wife is out there.”
She suddenly realized that she had her e-paper in her hand and already unfolded. She folded it into video mode and started recording even as Tolbrook lurched away from the young woman.
He yelped, “No! Don’t!”
The young woman shrieked and dropped behind the sofa as if she could disappear.
“Your wife is out there!” Helen yelled again. She felt like an oncoming train—unstoppable—a train of hot, righteous fury that would obliterate everything in its path.
Tolbrook tripped on his pants as he tried to get to Helen. “Turn that thing off!”
Helen turned away from him and rushed back to the doorway, one hand on the doorknob. “You really want me to go out there with this video?”
The man cursed again, his face still livid. Then he came at her fast.
Helen dropped her purse as she fumbled her canister of mace out of her jacket pocket with her one free hand and held it up.
He stopped short and did a little dance of rage with his pants still only half up.
“How much?” he shouted.
The woman popped up from behind the sofa and turned on him. “Shut up! Keep your voice down!”
How much what? Helen tried to understand. She willed her hands to stop shaking, but they wouldn’t listen.
“How much do you want to keep your mouth shut?” he demanded. He finally got his pants zipped. He struggled to get his shirt tucked back in.
“How much cash do you have on hand?” Helen asked coolly. Her stomach flipped, then dropped, at her own audacity.
His shirt under control, Tolbrook leaned on a side table. Sweat had broken out on his forehead, and he wiped it away.
Suddenly she remembered the original scheme. Target the Entitled who’d attended the Net Worth Notion, and give the money to the same charities they’d given pennies to at the fundraiser.
“You know what?” Helen said. “Not for me. Transfer money to charity. That’s what I want you to do. To Hand in Hand. You remember them? You gave them a thousandth of a percent at the Net Worth Notion.”
“Fine!” he raged. “How much?”
She’d transferred a hundred thousand dollars on behalf of Mr. Alvarez. Did she dare demand more from Tolbrook?
“Two hundred fifty thousand,” she said.
“You’re fucking kidding me,” he shouted. His face looked like a splotchy tomato.
His mistress yelled at him again, “Be quiet! You dumb shit. I can’t believe you didn’t lock the damn door. Your wife could have walked in.”
“Shut up,” he shouted. “You know what? Get out. Get out of my sight right now. You aren’t worth that much money, you better believe that. I wouldn’t have paid twenty bucks to bend you over.”
The woman’s mouth opened in silent shock and protest.
“I’m not paying you shit,” Tolbrook yelled at Helen. “Send the damn video out! I don’t care.”
The other woman shut her mouth with a snap, then opened it again. “You better not do that. My husband might be pissed off at me, but he will also call off the deal he’s about to sign with you. What’s that worth to you, twenty or thirty million?”
Tolbrook’s mouth worked in soundless rage, and Helen cut off a sharp laugh. “Oh, the price just went up,” she said. “It’s a million dollars now.”
“Damn straight.” The woman extended both middle fingers toward Tolbrook, then slipped out of a side door, leaving Helen alone with a man who was coming unglued in front of her eyes. Alone in the farthest and most private recesses of his enormous mansion.
He made straight for Helen, and she dodged behind an overstuffed chair, the can of mace still up. But all he had to do was come directly at her, using any one of the dozen couch pillows to shield himself from the stream of mace. Then she would be at his mercy.
She resorted to a bluff—one she’d seen in a movie. She gestured with the e-paper. “This thing is still recording. And this video is being livestreamed to my partner. If I don’t get out of here unharmed, he will release it to the public.
“You had better make that transfer. Otherwise, just like your little friend said, you’ll lose that business deal. One million dollars to Hand in Hand by five o’clock tomorrow night. Make sure you publicize it so it’s in the news. Or else at 5:01 p.m. I will release this video.
“Now I’m going to walk out of here and you’re not going to do a goddamn thing about it.”
Tolbrook stood s
till, his chin lowered and his fists clenched, breathing like an angry bull.
She got the hell out of there.
Helen left the mansion, swiping a small modern-art sculpture on her way out, and drove to the pawn shop high on adrenaline. The impromptu blackmail was her biggest victory yet. And the sculpture turned out to be worth eight thousand dollars—her first profit since the forty thousand she’d lost. She was back in business.
Although it scared her to show so much trust, she asked Egemon to hold half the money on a cash card for her in his secret back room, so that she couldn’t lose it again—although she didn’t tell him that. He gave her a long, curious look, but then he agreed, no questions asked.
On her way home from the pawn shop, the adrenaline fully wore off, and as she thought over what had happened, anxiety set in. If Tolbrook hadn’t fallen for her bluff… She had been alone with him in the back rooms of his enormous mansion. He could have beaten her, even killed her, and no one at the party would have heard her scream.
He had been so angry from the start. Livid. She remembered his little dance of rage. How he’d lunged at her. How his mistress had insulted and baited him, enraging him even further.
Quite possibly he had just been too angry to think straight. Quite possibly, Helen had been lucky as hell.
Helen rubbed her tired eyes as she drove. She resolved not to make that mistake again. She would never again confront a homeowner in private. It wasn’t worth it.
That night, she was doubly glad to take her sleeping pill, to just turn the lights off on the fear.
27 Days
Friday afternoon, while she sat in front of a projcom in a public library, Helen found herself wondering if she could use what had happened with Mr. Tolbrook to her advantage. Could she blackmail other members of the glitterati? It would be a new and far more powerful way to strike at the Entitled.
She felt a twinge of guilt as she contemplated it. The old Helen-of-the-high-road was dismayed. Be quiet, she told that part of herself. I’m not doing them real harm. I’m only taking a small part of their excess, and only for the benefit of those who are truly suffering.
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