Amsterdam 2020 (Amsterdam Series Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

and spent last summer mountain climbing in Switzerland.  Just looking at her you can feel cool Alpine breezes on your cheek, or so Katrien imagines.  All the children are in love with her.
    Katrien and Joury have already figured out they have to pipe in water, and have found a nearby spring on the map.  Gertruda then gives them a problem to solve: at what angle should they lay the pipe to provide maximum flow?  Already their team is busy with white PCV pipes, buckets of water, and stopwatches.  At first they think that a higher angle will create a faster flow, but discover that is not the case.  They are close to finding an answer, and already Katrien has realized that once they get water to Petra, they need a reservoir to hold it until the city needs it.
    The principal, a thin woman with short brown hair, walks into the room, tapping on the door jamb with her knuckles.  She often wanders in to watch the classes, but today she motions Gertruda to the door.  Katrien thinks she looks nervous, and hopes no one in Gertruda's family is hurt.
    After a short intense exchange, the principal leaves, and Gertruda claps her hands.  “That's all for today, children.  Neaten your stations, please.  We are cutting school short today.  Your parents have been called and will come to pick you up soon.”
    “My mother and father work in Haarlem,” says one girl.
    “Why do we have to leave?” asks a boy.  “We have a math test today.”
    Katrien sees Gertruda struggling to answer, trying not to lie—children must never be lied to—worried about upsetting them.  “You will make up your classes tomorrow.  Your parents will explain everything.  Put away your books and get your coats quickly and quietly.  Everyone . . . single file into the lunchroom.”
    As the children march down the hallway, teachers lean against the walls, talking on cellphones, whispering heatedly to one another.  Other teachers crowd in the principal's office, watching the news on television.  Katrien cannot hear what the newscaster is saying, but sees a clip of a crowd pushing and shoving down a smoke-filled street. 
    Dismissed from classes, students grab their cellphones out of their lockers.  It isn't long before a boy from a higher grade taps into his Twitter account.  Word spreads quickly around the lunch room.  Groups huddle around cellphones to watch live video.
    Joury's mother is one of the first parents to arrive.  She gives a percussive greeting to Katrien, then tells Joury to get her things.  She gathers several other Muslim boys and girls, telling them to follow her.  Her headscarf , usually pinned carefully below her chin, slips as she takes the smaller children's hands, leading them out.  Joury waves to Katrien.
    Katrien overhears two teachers arguing with the principal.
    “I can't get ahold of half of the parents.”
    “Call their emergency numbers.  We will give them an hour to pick up the children, then we will take them to safety.”
    “Where?  The church?  If they are bombing churches and synagogues, we can't take the children there.”
    “The police station?  Where is our bombshelter?”
    None of them know.  They practice fire drills, not bomb drills.
    The bells of Westerkerk clang in the distance.
     
    Allahu Akbar
     
    Katrien sits between her parents on their bed to watch television.  They sit close, even though the evening is warm. 
    The newscaster for NPO Nieuws reports that six young actors from the avant-garde Jenever Theater group have been murdered while dining in a private home on the outskirts of Amsterdam.  “The troupe is renown for their biting satire of politics and religion, and often present sketches highly critical of the way Muslims treat women and homosexuals.”  Their throats were slit ear to ear.  A note, pinned to the chest of one of the men, stated that the Jenever Theater group was “a sacrilege to Allah,” and that the actors were killed because they “terrorized and mocked