Noble Shoplifter

When disaster has struck, and most of the populace in the affected area is either dead or evacuated, the remaining survivors are sometimes forced to steal from local stores and homes to obtain the goods they need to survive the aftermath.

This situation can cause a moral quandary for people who have a strict code of honor. While most of the characters depicted will have little issues with doing what they need to get by, the Noble Shoplifter will struggle with the decision to steal from someone who may or may not be returning for their property at some point. While these characters are often shown to initially struggle with the decision, they will usually come up with a simple solution: they leave behind money or some other valuables that cover the cost of whatever they take. This makes the act less like "stealing" in the mind of the Noble Shoplifter, and more "buying without the previous owner's knowledge".

It's not uncommon for the Noble Shoplifter's companions to give him or her a hard time about it, arguing that the former owners are very likely dead and that priority should be given to the living. They may also argue that there is nothing to stop other groups of scavengers from taking the valuables the Noble Shoplifter leaves behind... in fact, a more unscrupulous member of the Noble Shoplifter's own party may find an excuse to backtrack and do exactly that.

This trope is primarily used to portray the moral fiber of a character. In works where the Noble Shoplifter is displayed in a positive light, this reflects that they are the kind of person who will do the right thing, regardless of the fact that there are no negative consequences to giving in to the impulse to just take what they need. Other works may serve as a contrast, framing the Noble Shoplifter as Lawful Stupid while their peers are simply being pragmatic given the circumstances.

A common variation of this trope takes place in non-disaster related stories wherein The Protagonist needs to get something from a shop, but the shop is closed or the clerk is unavailable. Usually pressed for time, the character will take what they need anyway but leave enough cash behind to cover it.

Contrast Disaster Scavengers, Planet Looters and Gentleman Thief. Rarely seen in a Scavenger World, as those settings are usually far beyond the point where original ownership matters. Can overlap with What You Are in the Dark.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• In Meteor, one of the student survivors of a meteor strike in Japan insists on leaving enough yen behind to cover the cost when his group finds food and water in a convenience store.

Comic Books

• In Green Arrow: City Walls, although the city is without power and looting is rampant, GA insists that his people leave payment whenever they take food or weapons from a store (although in this case it was actually a necessity that they do so; the city's current condition was due to a spell that summoned demonic forces if anyone broke the law within the city, which became hard not to do with limited access to money and other resources).
• Batman: No Man's Land: A variation occurs in a story that Alfred relates about Thomas Wayne while Bruce is facing a dilemma, about how he broke into a pharmacy to get drugs to treat a sick child from an impoverished family, and left behind money with an explaining note. This leads to a series of further payments by the increasingly extortionate pharmacist, that only ends when he has Alfred impersonate a police officer in order to recover the note.
• In Batman: Year One, Bats escape the police for good after they ambushed him in that abandoned building by taking a suit in a shop and leaving money to cover for it.

Films — Live-Action

• 28 Days Later, after raiding a deserted supermarket for supplies before making a run for a supposed safe zone in the north, the heroes leave behind a credit card.
• In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Hermione keeps doing this while the trio are on the run. She does this at least once in the book as well, though it isn't really shoplifting then, because she drops the money into the open till from under the cloak.
• The titular character in Finch is a post-apocalyptic scavenger who collects resources he needs from abandoned supermarkets and various other buildings, despite this he is very respectful to the dead by making sure not to cause any unnecessary damage to the long since deceased owners property.
• At the end of Hummingbird, Cristina receives a note from Joseph, revealing he has paid his debts to everyone including Damon: replacing the money he had taken from Damon's bank account, and paying in more as 'rent' for having lived in Damon's flat for months while Damon was away.
• After the three runaways from O Brother, Where Art Thou? swipe a pie left cooling on someone's windowsill, Delmar leaves $5 under a rock on the sill as payment.^note $5 in 1937 is about $80 in 2017
• In Panic in Year Zero! the family comes to a gas station where the owner is taking advantage of the disaster to charge an outrageous (for the time) price for gasoline. After trying and failing to reason with him, Harry knocks him out, takes the gas, and leaves enough money to pay for the gas at what he considers a fair price.
• Done unknowingly by Shaun in Shaun of the Dead. When the entire town is deserted, Shaun just goes about his daily business and goes to a convenience store to shop for groceries. When he notices the shopkeeper isn't there, he just puts his money on the counter rather than wait for him.
• In Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022), Sonic uses one of his rings to grab a package of Oreos from a grocery store, leaving some money behind. A customer watches this, bewildered.
• Undead or Alive: When the trio of wild west outcasts raid an unoccupied general store for supplies in the midst of an emerging Zombie Apocalypse, the cowboy-wannabe Elmer wonders if it's not wrong to be stealing despite the circumstance. Luke counters that rather than stealing, they're about to become the owner's "favorite customers" before tossing a large wad of bills on the counter.

Literature

• Anatole: Anatole and the Cat sees Anatole, in his plans to bell the cat that the owner of the cheese factory has brought in to keep mice away (unaware that one of his best employees is a mouse), sneak into a couple of shops during the night and take an item from the shelves, leaving a piece of cheese in payment.
• Discworld:
  • Captain Carrot in The Fifth Elephant who insists on leaving money behind when he takes food from isolated farmhouses whilst trailing a werewolf pack into the mountains. The houses themselves are not actually unoccupied, it's just that Carrot looks scary so the owners tend to hide when he approaches and acting as a Noble Shoplifter is easier than dragging them out and buying it normally.
  • Another variant: werewolf Angua sometimes kills chickens during her "time of the month," but always remembers where she's been and leaves money under the door. She's a strict vegetarian the rest of the time.
• From the second book of the His Dark Materials series, The Subtle Knife:
  Before they left, Will dropped some coins in the till behind the counter.
  "What you doing?" she said.
  "Paying. You have to pay for things. Don't they pay for things in your world?"
  "They don't in this one! I bet those other kids en't paying for a thing."
  "They might not, but I do."
• Jack Fleming from The Vampire Files does this when he needs new clothes, as he can't visit stores during daytime business hours and would cast no reflection in the mirrors of a tailor's shop. So he enters at night, takes what he needs off the rack, and leaves money on the counter.
• In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Hermione does this in the book, wondering if it's shoplifting because she drops money into the till before leaving the shop or leaves money under the chicken coop she took eggs from.
• The Executioner: In War Against the Mafia, Mack Bolan starts his crusade against the Mob by breaking into a gun store and taking a large amount of firearms and ammunition. However, he leaves behind enough cash to cover what he took, plus the damage to the store. When interviewed in the newspaper, the proprietor says he doesn't consider this a robbery, but rather a transaction that took place while the store was closed.
• In The Survivalist series by Jerry Ahern, John Rourke takes clothes from a store over the initial objections of Paul Rubenstein, whose objections are overcome when Rourke uses a Geiger counter to show that they've picked up radioactive fallout on their clothes. In the next novel they stop and help themselves to an abandoned container truck, only to be arrested by a self-proclaimed militia group who declares them looters to be executed on the spot. Rourke naturally has other ideas.
• The Day of the Triffids: In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the protagonist can't yet bring himself to break into a shop to acquire food even though it's increasingly clear to him that there's no help coming and things aren't going back to how they were. Even when he finds a delicatessen that's already had its front window smashed in by a car that swerved off the road, he leaves a fair price for the food he takes on the counter. He's made his peace with the new status quo within a few chapters.

Live-Action TV

• In The Incredible Hulk (1977), David Banner often did things like steal pants when necessary after changing back from the Hulk, but left money behind. But... where does he keep his wallet? On second thought, never mind.
• On Castle, the eponymous Castle's daughter is so noble that she pays when her friends shoplift.
• Inverted at one point on The Walking Dead: an abandoned pharmacy that two characters scavenge has a sign (implied to have been left by the original owner) telling survivors they are welcome to take whatever they need.
• In one episode of Bones, Booth makes a comment that "you gotta be bad sometimes to be good," meaning sometimes even the best people need to cut loose and do something "bad". Toward the end of the episode, while having dinner at the Founding Fathers, Brennan admits that she wants to try doing something "bad". Booth suggests that they skip out of the cafe without paying for their dinner and Brennan agrees. While she rushes for the door, Booth quietly leaves a few folded bills on the counter without telling her.
• In Van-Pires, the Motor-Vators in their transformed states need gasoline just as much as the Van-Pires. They make a point of leaving behind money to cover the gasoline they take from gas stations.

Music Videos

• The music videos for "Is Anybody Home?" by Our Lady Peace shows a woman waking up in a suddenly empty city. At one point she goes into a store to buy something. There's nobody at the cash register, and at first she simply leaves the money on the counter... the trope is then subverted in that she changes her mind and takes the money anyway.

Video Games

• EarthBound: In Happy Happy Village, there's a food cart with a sign saying they trust you to take what you need and leave the money. However, in this case, the player does have the option to leave without paying, so this trope depends on the player.
• Hilariously enough, played straight in Final Fantasy XV Episode Ardyn. As the name implies, you're playing as Ardyn, the Big Bad of the main game, who is currently leading an imperial attack on the Crown City; it is the intention of his superiors to invade and occupy the city once Ardyn has made it vulnerable, and Ardyn is here with intention to kill King Regis Lucis Caelum. The city is in emergency mode and all the civilians have fled, so all the shops are empty. But you're still buying your curatives from the shops throughout the city, indicating that Ardyn is leaving money behind.
• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess has a shop in the woods run by a trained parrot. The prices are laid out and you can take what you want. Paying extra, exact price, less, or not at all determines if you make the bird's day, have him thank you, call you a cheapskate, or outright attack you respectively. If you steal from him and show up later as a wolf (to whom he can actually speak fluently), he laments that his boss punished him for it as well. On the flipside, you're also free to just give him some cash without taking anything; you get nothing from it other than some very genuine and happy gratitude.
• Mario in Super Mario RPG. When the Mushroom Kingdom is under attack, the item shopkeeper can be found cowering in the back of the shop, with a sign on the counter saying to take what you want and leave the money. Reading it allows you to buy items as if the shopkeeper was there, with no option to leave without paying.
• When Pierre goes to spend a day on Ginger Island in Stardew Valley, he leaves a note asking people to pay the right price, and a basket for doing so. You don't have any other option.
• A variation in Ultima IV: all of the shopkeepers who sell magical reagents are present at the shops, but also all happen to be blind. The player has the option of buying as many reagents as they want and paying only 1 gp, but due to the virtue system present in the game, cheating the reagents woman results in a hit to Honesty and Honor, so you're really encouraged to pay full price to stay virtuous.
• In Xenogears, Fei does this at a shop in Nisan at a point in the game where the town has been evacuated due to an invasion (after the party kills all the invaders, of course).

Web Comics

• In Goblins, Big Ears insists that Thaco leaves money for the food he steals. In this case, the reason he can't shop normally is because he's a goblin in a city where goblins are feared.
• The Order of the Stick:
  • After escaping the prison where he was being held for his Evil Twin's crimes, Elan swipes a change of clothes from a shop. Lacking any money, all he can do is leave a note.
    Elan's Note: Sorry we stole from you ^note twice. It was for ^note really good cause.
  • Elan does it again to get a new lute while fleeing Azure City. This time, he leaves some money — even though the city is being abandoned. (When Haley and Belkar pass by the shop later, the money is gone.) Even though Elan is conscientious enough to pay for the lute, he thinks nothing of smashing the shop's front window to get to it.
• In El Goonish Shive, Ashley needs a soccer ball for reasons, but the shopkeeper is away due to those same reasons. So she complains for a panel about not remembering the local shopping tax before dropping a handful of bills on the counter and running off.
• Stand Still, Stay Silent: In the Sweden segment of the Distant Prologue, a family driving to their mountain cabin to escape The Plague stops at a gas station that turns out to be deserted. While the wife is simply happy that the place's personnel din't turn the gas pump off, the husband finds a delivery box containing the latest newspaper right outside the station's closed shop. He only takes one copy and leaves enough money for it behind.

Western Animation

• A variant occurs in one episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. Convinced that the impending solar eclipse will cause the end of the world, Gumball, Darwin, and Richard raid the local grocery store for supplies...with every intention of paying, of course, but the lines are obscene and the self-checkout refuses to behave. In the end, they charge out the door with a cart full of groceries and throw a fistful of money in the pursuing security guard's face.
• Arthur does this in an Imagine Spot in "Arthur's Treasure Hunt", imagining that he found a secret underground tunnel in his backyard that could lead him anywhere, including into a store after closing hours. After picking up charcoal for a barbecue, he leaves behind the appropriate cash, even calculating the tax.
• This happens in an episode of Codename: Kids Next Door when Number Two has to go to the grocery store, but it's already closed. He picks up the items he needs and leaves money behind, but still gets accused of trying to steal.
• In Batman: The Animated Series, Jack Ryder, having just transformed into The Creeper for the first time, ransacks a thrift store for new clothes while the clerk provides deadpan commentary. Batman is able to deduce The Creeper's identity because The Creeper paid for his purchase with Jack Ryder's credit card.
• In The Bots Master episode "Enter the Ninjzz", Blitzy, Cook, and Doc do this while stealing from a supermarket. Unfortunately, when Blitzy opens a register to load the money, she ends up setting off an alarm.
• One episode of The Simpsons saw Homer working at the Quik-E-Mart and fell asleep at the counter. In comes Ned Flanders who not only pays in full for his purchase but does so quietly as to not disturb Homer's rest.
• In Home (2015), Tip leaves some money on the counter of a store she grabs some food and drink from, despite there being an alien invasion going on, and the shopkeep almost certainly being hundreds of miles away, like the rest of humanity thanks to the invasion.
• In Shaun the Sheep, when Shaun and the flock steal human food (as opposed to disguising themselves as humans and buying it), they typically leave behind a hooffull of coins and notes for it, their two prime targets for this being the Pizza Boy and the Ice Cream Man. Notably, they do not do this when taking the Farmer's food.
• In the first episode of Steven Universe the Gems go out and steal Cookie Cats for Steven, but Pearl goes back and pays for them.

Real Life

• One of the triggers for the French Revolution was the government removing economic controls that kept the price of a loaf of bread low. Seeing the price of their staple foodstuff rocket overnight — to more than the average daily wage — the Parisian people took matters into their own hands and took over bakeries and flour-millers by force. However, by popular consent, they didn't just steal the bread: they very scrupulously distributed it to the people, who left behind the pre-inflationary price of seven sous per loaf, which they thought was a fair price. It was only when the Army was called in to quell the bread riots and summarily hang "ringleaders" that people started grabbing what they could and running. And so, a revolution started... not over principles of liberty, equality and brotherhood, but over something as basic and important as a subsistence diet.
• In 2013, four football players entered a convenience store in New Jersey that appeared open, when in reality the front door's lock had malfunctioned and the store was closed. After figuring out what was going on, the would-be shoppers left the appropriate amount of money on the front counter for the items they took, even flashing their cash at the security camera to make sure they were caught paying. The owner was so impressed by their honesty that she decided not to press charges, and even rewarded them with gift certificates. A news clip of the story can be found here.
• Some anarchists have been known to deliberately ignore shoplifters that steal necessities like food, baby formula and diapers. Hence the phrase, "If you see someone stealing baby formula, no you didn't".

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