The Darkroom of Damocles

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‘… He drifted around on his raft for days, without a drop to drink. He was dying of thirst, because the water of the ocean is salty. He hated the water that he couldn’t drink. But when his raft was struck by lightning and caught fire, he scooped up the hateful water with both hands to try and put out the flames!’

The teacher was the first to laugh, and finally the whole class joined in.

Then the bell rang. The children got up from their desks. Henri Osewoudt was half a head shorter than all the other boys. They trooped down the corridor in single file, breaking into a run as they reached the exit.

Mulling over the teacher’s story, Osewoudt became separated from the others by the arrival of a blue tram. He didn’t bother to catch up with them once the tram had passed. His eyes lit on the NO OVERTAKING sign which he read every day as he came out of school. The sign stands at the entrance to the narrow high street. The street is so narrow that the tramlines sidle towards each other until they overlap in a single track. Trams coming from opposite directions have to wait for their turn to cross the centre of Voorschoten.

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