The hotel lobby was marble, with an array of potted trees surrounding an oasis. A small restaurant lay at the other side. He was frankly impressed, and a little surprised. No doubt Satoshi was very rich, not far off being a billionaire depending on the day, but he had never seemed like the type to show off. And according to the blockchain, Satoshi’s stake had not yet changed hands.

A tall, black-haired woman came out of the elevator and introduced herself as Jan. ‘Welcome Dr Andresen. Just make your way up to the third floor, fourth room on the right. I have to go out to buy a clean laptop.’

A clean laptop: of course. Andresen had brought his own in case, but this made more sense. He reminded himself that he must remain skeptical until the burden of proof had been overcome. Until he had witnessed hard cryptographic evidence, he would have to assume Craig Steven Wright was a very smart imposter.

At the top of the elevator, the fourth door on the right was open. His heart pounded as he walked inside; a plain conference room, no furniture except a blank desk and a couple of chairs strewn about the room. By the window overlooking London, the man sat.

‘Gavin,’ the man said- coldly, he thought- and stood up to shake his hand. Dr Wright had sharp, inquisitive eyes and looked reasonably fit for his age. ‘How is Frodo?’

It dawned upon him. In his earlier exchanges with Satoshi, Andresen had mentioned the pet hamster in his home office, Frodo. He hadn’t posted about his office pet anywhere else online. That proved this man must have had access to Satoshi’s email account, at the very least. He reminded himself the email could still have been hacked.

‘Frodo died three years ago,’ he said, and countered with another indicator that Satoshi himself had mentioned. ‘How is your wife?”

‘She’s doing great,’ said Dr Wright. ‘I’ve been away for some time. I don’t think I ever showed you a picture of us… here we are.’

He showed him a photo from his wallet. It was over ten years old, and they looked to be in their early thirties. Andresen couldn’t help but notice that she looked Asian in origin- interesting evidence in itself- but he didn’t want to sound racist by drawing attention to it.

‘That’s cute,’ said Andresen, sitting down, trying not to be starstruck. ‘So, you know this is all very surreal. You’re the real Satoshi. Wow.’

‘That has yet to be shown. My assistant is getting the equipment. Until I have proven myself to you, I’m nobody.’

‘Why reveal yourself? Why now?’

‘It’s been seven years since genesis. Mainly, my hand was forced in an ongoing blackmail, which I’m not at liberty to disclose. Last year I was outed against my will and my home was ransacked by the Australian government for tax purposes. Luckily, the story didn’t catch on. The downside is that I was framed as some kind of scammer, which is affecting business. I don’t want to do this. But either the truth about me is known, and I can go back to work, or my public reputation will be ruined. I wanted to remain anonymous. I still do. I have no choice but to come clean. But I feel like you should be the first to know, Gavin.’

‘So what are your credentials?’

‘I have two PhD’s. I’m a computer scientist first and foremost. I taught computer science as an adjunct professor at CSU. I’ve designed many protocols and written many papers on cryptography, besides… you know. I created the world’s first online casino and have worked for several companies. Lately I’ve been building one of the biggest supercomputers outside of the public sector for studying scalability issues with Bitcoin. I thought that would interest you.’

Indeed, Andresen had come up with several proposals for increasing the capacity of the network, which had been mostly rejected by the community. At the back of his mind, he wondered if having the true founder on his side might help win the argument.

‘And the other one?’

‘I achieved a doctorate in theology,’ said Dr Wright.

Theology. That seemed rather wooly-minded of him.

‘Every civilization needs a creation myth,’ he said, eyes glinting with a strange fire the likes of which he’d never seen. ‘We think of ourselves as being outside and above history, like enlightened meta-observers. But we’re not.We’re still in it. 21 million coins, 21 centuries. I wanted to spark a rebirth of trust, a new and decentralized world of liberty, with its own money and its own law.’

‘Well, the blockchain is the best way of keeping history, whatever that is,’ Andresen offered.

‘I failed. Have you ever heard of the myth of Romulus and Remus?’

‘When I was a child. I’ve forgotten it now.’

‘I’ll tell you. Romulus and Remus were the twin brothers who founded the city of Rome. Their mother was Rhea Silva, the daughter of King Numitor. One day Numitor was toppled by his brother, Amulius, who seized power and forced Rhea to swear chastity and lived her life as a virgin. But Rhea was impregnated with twins by Mars, the god of war. Amulius was furious, and cast the babies on the river Tiber once they were born. The twins survived like sewer rats against all odds. They floated downstream and washed upon the banks of the Tiber and were suckled by a she-wolf, until a shepherd and his wife fostered them and raised them to be shepherds like themselves. They grew up strong. When they discovered their true origin, they led a revolution and defeated Amulius, restoring Numitor to the throne. But instead of inheriting the old kingdom themselves they founded a new village along the banks of the Tiber. And that was how Rome began.’

‘What happened then?’ Andresen said, feeling a little out of his depth.

‘It’s complicated. The point is that it’s no good trying to fix the old. Fork it, make it new, and conquer the old. That’s what the story is about.’

In his mind he marvelled, this is him. This is Satoshi Nakamoto, sitting in front of me. He even had the prickliness he had picked up from the emails. For a while he had thought it might be Dave Kleiman, a forensic computer investigator who had been reported to have died in his home in Florida from MRSA in 2013. The story had been posted in a Gizmodo article after several documents pointed his way. He doubted it now; if Kleiman really was Satoshi, he would have been posting and writing code from a hospital bed during their years of correspondence.

Not that it mattered of course, the network worked regardless of the founder’s identity. We are all Satoshi. Pfft. Yeah right.

The door opened, it was the assistant Jan with a fresh laptop still encased, followed by two men in suits. Both of the men came across as very vigilant and dark tempered, like security guards. Assassins, even.

‘I hope you don’t mind, these are associates from my company whom I trust,’ said Satoshi, standing up. ‘Gentlemen, this is Gavin Andresen from the Bitcoin Foundation. You’ve met Jan.’

They mumbled a greeting and stood watchfully at either side of the desk.