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‘Dear David,’ I emailed back, ‘I would have been less surprised if you had acquired a Thai wife. Christ Almighty, the champion of Suriname. We’ll go out for a spin soon.’

‘Definitely,’ he replied. ‘With Joost and André along. Team ride. Ordered a Rapha jersey. Do you know it? Brilliant, absolutely brilliant. Merino wool. And a silk bandana. If I’m going cycling, of course I want to look well groomed. That’s what they call it, isn’t it?’

I forward the email exchange to Joost and André.

I went into the Italian restaurant on the Houtmarkt, where David eats three times a week. He is a man of fixed habits; I didn’t have to look for where he was sitting. He was wearing a light-blue shirt, which combined elegantly with a pair of black trousers and shoes that looked as if they were woven. David orders his shirts from Italy, as well as his handmade shoes. He even travelled especially to Italy to have himself measured to the millimetre, one of the few foreign trips he has made in the last few decades.