Alexander Mccall Smith - Ladies' Detective Agency 05 (14 page)

“Get in, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni,”
shouted Mma Potokwane above the noise of the engine. She seemed vaguely annoyed
that he was holding things up in some way, and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni obeyed, as he
always did.

Mma Potokwane seemed quite confident, leaning forward to
flick switches and adjust instruments. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni reached to touch a
switch that appeared to need attention, as an orange light was flashing behind
it, but his hand was brushed away by Mma Potokwane.

“Don’t
touch!” she shouted, as if addressing an orphan.
“Dangerous!”

He sat back, and the little plane shot forward
down the runway. The trees were so close, he thought, the grass so soft that he
could jump out now, roll over, and escape; but there was no getting away from
Mma Potokwane, who looked at him crossly and shook a finger in admonition. And
then they were airborne, and he looked out of the window of the plane at the
land below him, which was growing smaller and smaller, a miniaturised Botswana
of cattle like ants and roads like thin strips of twisting brown thread. Oh, it
was so beautiful to look down on his land and see the clouds and the blue and
all the air. One might so easily step out onto such clouds and drift away, off
to the West, over the great brown, and alight somewhere where the lions walked
and where there were springs of water and tall trees and little sign of
man.

Mma Potokwane pulled on the controls of the plane and they
circled, hugging the edge of the town so far below. He looked down and he saw
Zebra Drive; it was so easy to spot it, and was that not Mma Ramotswe waving to
him from her yard, and Mma Makutsi, in her new green shoes? They were waving,
smiling up at him, pointing to a place on the ground where he might land. He
turned to Mma Potokwane, who smiled at him now and pointed to the handle of the
door.

He reached out and no more than touched the door before it flew
open. He felt the wind on his face, and the panic rose in him, and he tried to
stop himself falling, holding onto one of the levers in the plane, a little
thing that gave him no purchase. Mma Potokwane was shouting at him, taking her
hands off the controls of the plane to shove him out, and now kicked him firmly
in the back with those flat brown shoes which she wore to walk about the orphan
farm. “Out!” she cried, and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, mute with fear,
slipped out into the empty air and tumbled, head over heels, now looking at the
sky, now at the ground, down to the earth that was still so far away beneath
him.

There was no parachute, of course, just pyjamas, and they were
billowing about him, hardly slowing him up at all.
This is how it
ends
, thought Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, and he began to think of how good life
had been, and how precious; but he could not think of these things for long,
for his fall was over in seconds and he landed on his feet, perfectly, as if he
might have hopped off an old orange box at the garage; and there he was, out in
the bush, beside a termite mound. He looked about him; it was an unfamiliar
landscape, perhaps Tlokweng, perhaps not, and he was studying it when he heard
his father’s voice behind him. He turned round, but there was no sign of
his father, who was there but not quite there, in the way in which the dead can
come to us in our dreams. There was much that he wanted to ask his father,
there was much that he wanted to tell him about the garage, but his father
spoke first, in a voice which was strange and reedy—for a dead man has no
breath to make a voice—and asked a question which woke up Mr J.L.B.
Matekoni, wrenching him from his dream with its satisfactory soft landing by
the termite mound.

“When are you going to marry Mma
Ramotswe?” asked his father. “Isn’t it about
time?”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

MEETING MR BOBOLOGO

M
MA RAMOTSWE
had not been ignoring Mma Holonga’s case. It was true that she had as yet
done nothing, but that did not mean that she had not been thinking about how
she would approach this delicate issue. It would not do for any of the men to
discover that they were being investigated, as this would give offence and
could easily drive away any genuine suitor. This meant that she would have to
make enquiries with discretion, talking to people who knew these men and, if at
all possible, engineering a meeting with them herself. That would require a
pretext, but she was confident that one could be found.

The first
thing she would have to do, she thought, was to talk to somebody who worked at
Mr Bobologo’s school. This was not difficult, as Mma Ramotswe’s
maid, Rose, had a cousin who had for many years been in charge of the school
kitchen. She had stopped working now, and was living in Old Naledi, where she
looked after the children of one of her sons. Mma Ramotswe had never met her,
but Rose had mentioned her from time to time and assured her employer that a
visit would be welcome.

“She is one of these people who is always
talking,” said Rose. “She talks all day, even if nobody listens to
her. She will be very happy to talk to you.”

“Such people
are very helpful in our work,” said Mma Ramotswe. “They tell us
things we need to know.”

“This is such a lady,” said
Rose. “She will tell you everything she knows. It makes her very happy to
do that. You will need a long, long time.”

There were many people
like that in Botswana, Mma Ramotswe reflected, and she was glad that this was
so. It would be strange to live in a country where people were silent, passing
one another in the street wordlessly, as if frightened of what the other might
think or say. This was not the African way, where people would call out and
converse with one another from opposite sides of a road, or across a wide
expanse of bush, careless of who heard. Such conversations could be carried on
by people walking in different directions, until voices grew too faint and too
distant to be properly heard and words were swallowed by the sky. That was a
good way of parting from a friend, so less abrupt than words of farewell
followed by silence. Mma Ramotswe herself often shouted out to the children
after they had left the house for school, reminding Puso to be careful of how
he crossed the road or telling him to make sure that his shoelaces were tied
properly, not that boys ever bothered about that sort of thing. Nor did boys
ensure that their shirts were tucked into their trousers properly, but that was
another issue which she could think about later, when the demands of clients
were less pressing.

Rose’s cousin, Mma Seeonyana, was at home
when Mma Ramotswe called on her. Her house was not a large one—no more
than two small rooms, Mma Ramotswe saw—but her yard was scrupulously
clean, with circles traced in the sand by her wide-headed broom. This was a
good sign; an untidy yard was a sign of a woman who no longer bothered with the
traditional Botswana virtues, and such people, Mma Ramotswe found, were almost
always unreliable or rude. They had no idea of
botho,
which meant
respect or good manners.
Botho
set Botswana apart from other places;
it was what made it a special place. There were people who mocked it, of
course, but what precisely did they want instead? Did they want people to be
selfish? Did they want them to treat others unkindly? Because if you forgot
about
botho,
then that was surely what would happen; Mma Ramotswe was
sure of that.

She saw Mma Seeonyana standing outside her front door, a
brown paper bag in her hand. As she parked the tiny white van at the edge of
the road, she noticed the older woman watching her. This was another good sign.
It was a traditional Botswana pursuit to watch other people and wonder what
they were up to; this modern habit of indifference to others was very hard to
understand. If you watched people, then it was a sign that you cared about
them, that you were not treating them as complete strangers. Again, it was all
a question of manners.

Mma Ramotswe stood at the gate and called out to
Mma Seeonyana. The other woman responded immediately, and warmly, inviting Mma
Ramotswe to come in and sit with her at the back of the house, where it was
shadier. She did not ask her visitor what she wanted, but welcomed her, as if
she were a friend or neighbour who had called in for a chat.

“You are the woman who lives over that way, on Zebra Drive,”
said Mma Seeonyana. “You are the woman who employs Rose. She has told me
about you.”

Mma Ramotswe was surprised that she had been
recognised, but further explanation was quickly provided. “Your van is
very well-known,” said Mma Seeonyana. “Rose told me about it, and I
have seen you driving through town. I have often thought: I would like to get
to know that lady, but I never thought I would have the chance. I am very happy
to see you here, Mma.”

“I have heard of you too,”
said Mma Ramotswe. “Rose has spoken very well of you. She was very proud
that you were in charge of those school kitchens.”

Mma Seeonyana
laughed. “When I was in that place I was feeding four hundred children
every day,” she said. “Now I am feeding two little boys. It is much
easier.”

“That is what we women must do all the
time,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I am feeding three people now. I have a
fiancé and I have two children who are adopted and who come from the
orphan farm. I have to make many meals. It seems that women have been put in
the world to cook and keep the yard tidy. Sometimes I think that is very unfair
and must be changed.”

Mma Seeonyana agreed with this view of the
world, but frowned when she thought of the implications. “The trouble is
that men would never be able to do what we do,” she said. “Most men
will just not cook. They are too lazy. They would rather go hungry than cook.
That is a big problem for us women. If we started to do other things, then the
men would fade away and die of hunger. That is the problem.”

“We could train them,” said Mma Ramotswe. “There is much
to be said for training men.”

“But you have to find a man
to train,” said Mma Seeonyana. “And they just run away if you try
to tell them what to do. I have had three men run away from me. They said that
I talked too much and that they had no peace. But that is not true.”

Mma Ramotswe clicked her tongue in sympathy. “No, Mma, it cannot be
true. But sometimes men seem not to like us to talk to them. They think they
have already heard what we have to say.”

Mma Seeonyana sighed.
“They are very foolish.”

“Yes,” said Mma
Ramotswe. Some men were foolish, she thought, but by no means all. And there
were some very foolish women too, if one thought about it.

“Even
teachers,” said Mma Seeonyana. “Even teachers can be foolish
sometimes.”

Mma Ramotswe looked up sharply. “You must have
known many teachers, Mma,” she said. “When you were working in that
place you must have known all the teachers.”

“Oh I
did,” said Mma Seeonyana. “I knew many teachers. I saw them come as
junior teachers and I saw them get promotion and become senior teachers. I saw
all that happening. And I saw some very bad teachers too.”

Mma
Ramotswe affected surprise. “Bad teachers, Mma? Surely not.”

“Oh yes,” said Mma Seeonyana. “I was astonished over what
I found out. But I suppose teachers are the same as anybody else and they can
be bad sometimes.”

Mma Ramotswe looked down at the ground.
“Who were these bad teachers?” she asked. “And why were they
bad?”

Mma Seeonyana shook her head. “They came and
went,” she said. “I do not remember all their names. But I do
remember a man who came to the school for six months and then the police took
him away. They said he had done a very bad thing, but they never told us what
it was.”

Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “That must have been
very bad.” She paused, and then, “The good teachers must have been
ashamed. Teachers like Mr Bobologo, for example. He’s a good teacher,
isn’t he?”

She had not expected the reply, which was a peal
of laughter. “Oh that one! Yes, Mma. He’s very good all
right.”

Mma Ramotswe waited for something more to be said, but
Mma Seeonyana merely smiled, as if she were recalling some private, amusing
memory. She would have to winkle this out without giving the impression of
being too interested. “Oh,” she said. “So he’s a
ladies’ man, is he? I might have suspected it. There are so many
ladies’ men these days. I am surprised that there are any ordinary
husbands left at all.”

This brought forth another burst of
laughter from Mma Seeonyana, who wiped at her eyes with the cuff of her blouse.
“A ladies’ man, Mma? Yes, I suppose you could say that! A
ladies’ man! Yes. Mr Bobologo would be very pleased to hear that,
Mma.”

Mma Ramotswe felt a momentary irritation with Mma
Seeonyana. It was discourteous, in her view, to make vague allusions in
one’s conversation with another—allusions which the other could not
understand. There was nothing more frustrating than trying to work out what
another person was saying in the face of coyness or even deliberate
obfuscation. If there was something which Mma Seeonyana wanted to say about Mr
Bobologo, then she should say it directly rather than hinting at some private
knowledge.

“Well, Mma,” said Mma Ramotswe in a firm tone.
“Is Mr Bobologo a ladies’ man, or is he not?”

Mma
Seeonyana stared at her. She was still smiling, but she had picked up the note
of irritation in her visitor’s voice and the smile was fading.
“I’m sorry, Mma,” she said. “I didn’t mean to
laugh like that. It’s just that … well, it’s just that you
touched upon a very funny thing with that man. He is a ladies’ man, but
only in a very special sense. That was what was so funny.”

Mma
Ramotswe nodded encouragingly. “In what sense is he a ladies’ man
then?”

Mma Seeonyana chuckled. “He is one of those men who
is worried about street ladies. These bad girls who hang about in bars. That
sort of woman. He disapproves of them very strongly and he and some friends of
his have been trying for years to save these girls from their bad ways. It is
his hobby. He goes to the bus station and hands leaflets to young girls coming
in from the villages. He warns them about what can happen in
Gaborone.”

Mma Ramotswe narrowed her eyes. This was very
interesting information, but it was difficult to see what exactly it told her.
Everybody was aware of the problem of bar girls, who were the scourge of
Africa. It was sad to see them, dressed in their shoddy finery, flirting with
older men who should know better, but who almost inevitably did not. Nobody
liked this, but most people did nothing about it. At least Mr Bobologo and his
friends were trying.

“It’s a hopeless task,” Mma
Seeonyana continued. “They have set up some sort of place where these
girls can go and live while they try to get honest jobs. It is over there by
the African Mall.” She stopped and looked at Mma Ramotswe. “But
I’m sure that you didn’t come here to talk about Mr Bobologo, Mma.
There are better things to talk about.”

Mma Ramotswe smiled.
“I have been very happy to talk about him,” she replied. “But
if there are other things you would like to talk about, I am happy with
that.”

Mma Seeonyana sighed. “There are so many things to
talk about, Mma. I don’t really know where to start.”

This,
thought Mma Ramotswe, was a good cue, and she took it. She remembered
Rose’s warning, and she could see the afternoon, her precious Sunday
afternoon, disappearing before her. “Well, I could always come back to
visit you, Mma …”

“No,” said Mma Seeonyana
quickly. “You must stay, Mma. I will make you some tea and then I can
tell you about something that has been happening around here that is very
strange.”

“You are very kind, Mma.”

Mma
Ramotswe sat down on the battered chair which Mma Seeonyana had pulled out of
the doorway. This was duty, she supposed, and there were more uncomfortable
ways of earning a living than listening to ladies like Mma Seeonyana gossiping
about neighbourhood affairs. And one never knew what one might learn from such
conversations. It was her duty to keep herself informed, as one could not tell
when some snippet of information gathered in such a way would prove useful;
just as the information about Mr Bobologo and the bar girls might prove useful,
or might not. It was difficult to tell.

MMA MAKUTSI
was also busy that Sunday, not on the affairs of the No. 1 Ladies’
Detective Agency, but on the move to her new house. The simplest way of doing
this would have been to ask Mma Ramotswe to bring her tiny white van to carry
over her possessions, but she was unwilling to impose in this way. Mma Ramotswe
was generous with her time, and would have readily agreed to help her, but Mma
Makutsi was independent and decided to hire a truck and a driver for the hour
or so it would take to move her effects to their new home. There was not much
to move, after all: her bed, with its thin coir mattress which she would soon
replace, her single chair, her black tin trunk with her clothes folded within
it, and a box containing her shoes, her pot, pan, and small primus stove. These
were the worldly goods of Mma Makutsi which were quickly piled up in the back
of the truck by the muscular young man who drove up the bumpy track that
morning.