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I asked when he had started cycling.

‘About a year ago. On my old man’s Raleigh. Part of my inheritance, you could say. Had it done up and rode it until last month. Cycling with my dead father, that feeling. Had long conversations. Good conversations. Of course, he didn’t think what I was doing would amount to anything. I’ll tell you another time.’ He paused for a moment. ‘That bike is bewitched.’

‘I know that. I sometimes think that with every cyclist you come across, there’s an invisible peloton riding along with him.’

‘Recently I had the feeling that we’d finished. That I had more or less told him everything. Then I thought: time for something new. That Raleigh was made in 1977, so it was about time. And I thought it was rather a weird idea, that bike. That’s not that odd, is it?’

‘No. I wouldn’t want to ride one metre on it.’

We came to a white drawbridge. We crossed, after which we headed for town again along the other bank of the Rotte. On the Crooswijk bend, André cycled alongside me and put his arm on my shoulder. Then he stood up and pulled away from me. A little further on he sat up and stuck his arms in the air.