“Yes.” Marian’s smile brightened.
“A knowbot program can do more than one thing at once, right?”
“Of course, Mr. Burns. It’s what we’re designed for.”
“Could a knowbot program access, say, the public library files and from there access other databases, transferring the information through the library system, so the transaction would be kept under the privacy restrictions if anybody wanted to look at it?”
Marian hesitated, her smile faded for the first time in Kiah’s memory. “Would this be for the purposes of conducting illegal transactions?”
“Yes, it would.”
“Well… I couldn’t do it, Mr. Burns. Knowbot programs and all their sub-programs have an ID flag, rather like a fingerprint or a DNA sequence. The flag is recorded in the databases they contact along with a record of what information was retrieved, just in case anyone in authority needs to track a transaction.”
“Could you write a knowbot program that would create sub-programs without the ID flag?”
Marian’s eyes shifted between the shelves and the check out counter. “This is a hypothetical question, Mr. Burns?”
“Yes,” Kiah lied.
“Then, hypothetically, yes, I could. It would be illegal of course, and subject the perpetrator to prosecution and probably cause them to be banned from the networks permanently.”
That gave Kiah pause. Someone banned from the networks couldn’t even make a phone call. He thought of Rivera lying in his bed and staring out his window, for the rest of his life.
Why would he risk that? Just to give Louisa Fowler a tax break? Especially… Kiah stopped. Especially since with a knowbot program and network access he could still be in business for himself. Maybe he wouldn’t be living in such style, but still…
“Miss Marian, I need a record of the knowbot sub-program that left the Chicago public library files while Mr. Rivera had accessed the library. Specifically, I need a complete list of the outgoing knowbots with ID flags that do not match any of the flags of the incoming knowbots. Then, I need the unmatched knowbots traced.”
Marian did not frown, exactly, but she looked troubled. “That could take awhile, Mr. Burns. The main branch of the Chicago Public Library handles several million knowbot transactions a day.”
“Can you do it?”
“Ye… es.” she paused. “The trace may not be complete because of privacy regulations.”
“Miss Marian.” Kiah planted both hands on the check-out counter. “This is an official IRS investigation of possible tax fraud. These proceedings are being initiated on my authority as Senior Investigative Agent for Cook County. You will do what I asked. And while you’re at it, you’ll find out if Mr. Rivera, the private investigator, ever caught anyone capable of writing that hypothetical, illegal program we discussed. Is that clear?”
Marian flashed her brightest smile. “I’m sure we have what you need. If you’ll excuse me a minute, I’ll go look this up.”
The virtual reality interface for Rivera’s phone system showed Kiah a perfect reproduction of the hospital room he’d walked into two days before. Instead of a corpse in a bed, however, Kiah faced a long-bodied man seated in a comfortable armchair in front of the window. He took a moment to admire the detail in the simulation. It was probably directly responsive to Rivera’s voice patterns and would adjust the facial features to match them.
“Hello, Mr… Burns,” Rivera greeted him uncertainly.
“Thank you for agreeing to see me, Mr. Rivera.” Kiah’s simulated self sat across from Rivera. He folded his hands. He had practiced this attitude back when he was still a junior auditor. It radiated calm. He had liked to try to keep his interviewees calm, even when he had to explain what their audit had uncovered.
“I can’t think of anything I’ve done lately that would attract the IRS’s attention,” Rivera laughed. “I don’t even have a bank account. Louisa handles all that for me.” He gestured towards the empty bed. “I’m a little housebound these days.”
“Not really. You’ve still got your network access.” Kiah smiled. “Must be a real godsend for you.”
Rivera sighed. “Yeah, it is. The wonders of modern technology, eh? It’s great of Louisa to keep it open for me, even if I can’t use it like I used to.”
“Oh?” Kiah’s eyebrows arched.
“Yeah. I know it doesn’t sound like it, Mr. Bums, but I suffered from severe oxygen deprivation in my accident. It caused permanent brain damage. What you’re hearing is enhanced in more ways than one. I’m all but hardwired into this interface because I can’t even think straight anymore.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Mr. Rivera. I guess that answers my question.”
“What question?” Rivera’s face tightened.
“Well, as I’m sure you know, Ms. Fowler’s trying to have you declared a dependent. It would give her a nice tax break. The whole situation’s fairly irregular, though. So before I can recommend a course of action to my superior, I had to check things out. You understand.”
“Sure.” Rivera smiled without any of his facial muscles loosening. “Sounds like Louisa. If there isn’t a straight line between two points, make one.”
“Sounds like a difficult person to get along with.”
“Oh, yeah.” Rivera’s gaze strayed out the window. “Next to impossible sometimes.”
“I guess that’s why you moved out.”
Rivera’s entire body jerked. “How… oh, my records. I forget, the IRS still has all that stuff, don’t they?”
Kiah nodded. “We still do. Not that we really need it anymore. 1 guess it’s just a habit the bureaucracy developed. Wonder if there’s a twelve-step program for it?” They shared the laugh. Rivera relaxed visibly.
“Yeah,” Kiah crossed his legs and leaned back. “We don’t do much these days, that’s for sure, but we still deal with a lot of people. Like, talk about coincidence, I was on the lines with one of your ex-wives just yesterday.” He shook his head. “She didn’t have much good to say about you. ‘Leech,’ I think, was her most polite term. She said you sort of lived off her between jobs and then left.
“And I got to thinking, what if that was a kind of habit with you? What if you did that to Louisa Fowler, and then when she heard about your accident, she managed to dish out a little profitable revenge. She set you up so you were looked after and comfortable and then used your skills to augment her business. You’d be paying your own way then, and if she could hide that fact, she could use the expense of looking after you to arrange a substantially reduced rate of withholding. And I do mean substantial. You wouldn’t believe the numbers I came up with.” Kiah folded his arms. Rivera went back to staring out the window.
“That’s of course before you told me about the brain damage. I’m glad you did. I must have missed that in your medical records. I was ready—God, this is embarrassing—but I was ready to accuse Ms. Fowler of all kinds of things. Fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud. Tax evasion. Kidnapping. Coercion. Blackmail.
“See, 1 thought that someone who knew the networks as well as she does could, theoretically, get into your insurance company’s networks and cut off your insurance after your accident, making it look like the company had cut it off before the accident for nonpayment of premiums. If she did that, then she could make a proposition that you come to work for her under her terms. She might even have evidence of some illegal activities in your past, like that you used to be a cracker or something like that. She could have used all of that to blackmail you into complying, because if you were convicted of being a cracker, you’d be permanently banned from the networks, and left in a state hospital, without insurance and…” He shook his head. “That’d be beyond imagining, wouldn’t it?”