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in.”
    Christien nodded. “This is what we believe, yes.”
    “Are you certain this man actually exists?”
    “What d’you mean?”
    “Have you ever heard of Domenico Scarfo?”
    Christien shook his head.
    “He was a notorious boss of the Philadelphia mob in the forties and fifties. Behind his back, people called him ‘Little Nicky’ because he was five-six, but his full name was Nicodemo Domenico Scarfo.”
    “What are you saying?”
    Bourne set aside his menu. “I’ve come across this kind of thing several times before. A name is created, a legend is built, fed first by myth, then by rumors and innuendo, sometimes even by murders committed by a cadre of people who work for the people who created the name in the first place.”
    Christien plucked a warm roll from a basket in the center of the table and began to butter it. “Your own origin, if my sources are correct.”
    “The Jason Bourne identity was created this way, yes.” Bourne took a sip of fresh orange juice.
    Christien spooned up some lingonberry jam. “And now you are Jason Bourne.”
    Bourne nodded. “I am. Identities are powerful images that often take on a life of their own and have unintended consequences. But if I hadn’t lost my memory...”
    Christien nodded thoughtfully. “We’re back to Alef. I take your point.” He bit into his roll and looked up at the waiter, who had appeared by their side. He raised his eyebrows at Bourne, who ordered scrambled eggs and gravlax, toast, and more coffee. “I’ll have the same,” he said.
    When the waiter left, Bourne said, “Have you or Don Fernando entertained the notion that Nicodemo is an identity Tom Brick created so that he could circumvent the law without any blowback for either him or Core Energy?”
    Christien said, “Nicodemo exists, believe me.”
    Bourne looked up. “You’ve met him?”
    “Don Fernando believes he has.” He was speaking of Don Fernando Hererra, his sometime partner, an industrialist, banker, and friend with whom Bourne had had dealings previously.
    “Even if I accept what you tell me, all we know for certain is that he’s met someone purporting to be Nicodemo. It doesn’t mean that Nicodemo actually exists.”
    “I should take lessons from you on cynicism.”
    “One man’s cynicism is another man’s prudence,” Bourne said. “Speaking of Don Fernando, where is he? It would be helpful to speak with him.”
    “He’s away.”
    “You’ll have to do better than that,” Bourne said shortly.
    The food came then. They were both silent until the waiter left and they began to eat.
    “The truth is,” Christien said, “he has asked me to keep his whereabouts secret.”
    Bourne put down his fork and sat back. “Look, make a decision. Do you and Don Fernando want my help or not?”
    “Either way, you’ll have to deal with this growing menace. Core Energy forced us to use subterfuge to buy into the Indigo Ridge Rare Earths mine in California. If we hadn’t, it would have bought it out from under America. We couldn’t allow that to happen. But Core has been busy elsewhere, buying up rare earth, uranium, gold, silver, copper, and base metals mines in Canada, Africa, and Australia. In the decades to come, these resources will increase in value exponentially as one nation after another is forced to phase out machines that run on oil, coal, and even natural gas. The world is running out of oil. As for coal, we’ll all be choking on the carcinogenic fumes that plague every city in China, India, and Thailand unless we abandon it as an energy source. Solar panels aren’t energy efficient and as for those much-hyped wind turbines, each one requires four hundred pounds of rare earths. Besides, you can’t put a windmill on a car or an airplane. Hybrid cars are dependent on rare earth components as well, and as for electric cars, where d’you think the electricity comes from?”
    Christien shook his head. “Nicodemo has seen the future and it’s energy.”
    “But