In the Company of Cheerful Ladies

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN MMA RAMOTSWE, MR J.L.B. MATEKONI, AND MR POLOPETSI GET AN UNPLEASANT SURPRISE

MR J.L.B. MATEKONI was sound asleep by the time that Mma Ramotswe arrived home from her visit to the Mokoti house. When he awoke the next morning, Mma Ramotswe was already out of bed and walking in the garden, nursing a cup of bush tea in her hands. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni got up, washed and dressed, and went out to find her standing sunk in thought in front of the mopipi tree.

“It is a fine morning again,” he said, as he walked up to her.

She turned to him and smiled. “I am always happiest in the early morning,” she said. “Standing here in the garden watching the plants wake up. It is very good.”

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni agreed. He found it difficult to get out of bed quite as early as she did, but he knew that the first few hours of light was the best part of the day, a time of freshness and optimism. He particularly liked it when he was in at the garage early enough to feel the first rays of the sun on the back of his neck as he worked on an engine. That was perfection itself—a state of bliss for a mechanic—to be warm (but not too warm) and comfortable while he worked on a challenging engine. Of course it depended to a great extent on the engine. There were some engines that made one despair—engines with inaccessible corners and parts that were difficult to reorder—but an engine that wasco-operative was a delight to work on.

Mma Ramotswe’s tiny white van was a case in point. He had spent a great deal of time on that van and felt that he knew it quite well now. Its engine was not a difficult one to deal with, as all the essential parts could be got at without too much trouble, but it could not be kept going forever and he was not sure whether Mma Ramotswe understood that. He had the same problem with Mma Potokwane and the old minibus that she used to transport the orphans. It was a miracle that that vehicle was still going—or rather it was down to the constant nursing by Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. Sooner or later, though, one had to face reality with an old vehicle and accept that it had come to the end of its life. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni understood the attachment that people developed to a car or a truck, but sentiment had got to be kept in its place. If we are prepared to throw away old clothes, then why not throw away old vehicles once they had had their day? He had noted that Mma Ramotswe had been ready to throw out his clothes, and it was only after a spirited defence on his part that he had succeeded in keeping some of the jackets and trousers which had served him well and which—in his opinion at least—still had a great deal to offer. But his opposition had not prevented her from getting rid of several pairs of trousers (which still had a lot of wear in them and which had only one or two patches), a favourite pair of old brown veldschoens, and a jacket which he had bought at OK Bazaars over the border in Mafikeng with his first pay cheque as a qualified mechanic. He had wanted to ask her how she would feel if he had gone through her wardrobe and thrown out some of her dresses, but he had refrained from doing so. It was an entirely hypothetical question anyway; it would never have occurred to him to do such a thing. And he readily admitted that he knew nothing about women’s clothing, as most men would have to admit; and yet women always claimed to know what clothes were right for a man. There was some injustice here, thought Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, although he was not quite sure how one might pursue the point.

Standing beside Mma Ramotswe, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni took a lungful of the early morning air.

“And how did it go?” he asked, as he breathed out. “Did you find him?”

“He was not there,” said Mma Ramotswe. “But I spoke to his mother and that was useful. I learned something important.”

“And what was this important thing?” asked Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, closing his eyes and breathing in deeply again.

Mma Ramotswe did not answer his question. She should not have said anything about it, she realised, even if she wanted to share the overwhelming sense of relief that the visit had brought her.

“Well?” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, opening his eyes and looking around the yard. “The important thing. Why is it …” He stopped. Then, frowning, asked, “Where is the white van?”

Mma Ramotswe sighed. “It broke down on the way back. It is sitting out over there.” She waved a hand in the general direction of the south, the direction of Lobatse, the Cape, and the oceans to the south of the Cape. “It is down there.”

“Broke down?” asked Mr J.L.B. Matekoni sharply. “What happened?”

Mma Ramotswe told him of how the engine had suddenly lost power and then stopped. She told him that there had been no warning, but that it had all happened rather quickly, just before she reached the main road. Then she mentioned the oil and her suspicions that it had something to do with the cracking of the sump on a rock.

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni grimaced. “You are probably right,” he said reproachfully. “Those rocks can do a lot of damage. You really shouldn’t take a small van like that on those roads. They’re not built for that sort of work.”

Mma Ramotswe took the rebuke quietly. “And if the engine has seized? What then?”

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni shook his head. “It is very bad news. You’ll need a new engine block. I don’t think it would be worth it.”

“So I would need a new van?”

“Yes, you would.”

Mma Ramotswe thought for a moment. “I have had that van for a long time,” she said. “I am very fond of it. They do not make vans like that any more.”

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni looked at her and was suddenly filled with a great sense of pride. There were some women who would be only too eager to get hold of a new van or car and who would willingly scrap a faithful vehicle for the sake of something flashier and smarter. It made him feel proud to know that Mma Ramotswe was not like that. Such a woman would never want to trade in an old and useless husband for a newer, smarter man. That was very reassuring.

“We’ll take a look at it,” he said. “You must never say that a van is finished until you’ve had a good look. We can go out in my truck and collect it. I’ll tow you back.”

THERE WAS NOTHING very much happening at the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency that morning. Mma Makutsi was planning to go out, with a view to pursuing, without any real hope of success, the elusive Zambian financier, and with her correspondence up to date, there was little for Mma Ramotswe to do. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had a car to service, but it was an uncomplicated job and could safely be left to the remaining apprentice. As for Mr Polopetsi, he never liked to be idle, and would fill any spare minutes tidying the garage, sweeping the floor, or even polishing the cars of customers. On several occasions a client of the agency had come out of a meeting with Mma Ramotswe to discover that his car had been washed and waxed while he was consulting the agency. This was often very much appreciated, and was another point in favour of Mr Polopetsi.

“Just imagine if everybody in Botswana was like that,” Mma Ramotswe had remarked to Mma Makutsi. “Imagine how successful this country would be. We would be so rich we wouldn’t know what to do.”

“Can you ever be that rich?” asked Mma Makutsi. “Surely there is always something to spend your money on. More shoes, for example.”

Mma Ramotswe had laughed. “You can only wear one pair of shoes at a time,” she said. “Rich people are like the rest of us—two feet, ten toes. We are all the same that way.”

Mma Makutsi was not sure about this. One might not be able to wear more than one pair of shoes at a time, but that did not mean that one could not wear a different pair each day, or even one pair in the morning and another in the afternoon. Did rich people do that sort of thing, she wondered. She only had two pairs of shoes at the moment, although she was planning to acquire another pair before too long. She had her ordinary working shoes, which were brown and had been resoled and repaired rather more times than she would care to remember; and then there was her special pair of shoes, green on the outside and with sky-blue linings—the pair of shoes which she had bought with the first profits of the Kalahari Typing School for Men and of which she was so inordinately proud. She wore these shoes to work from time to time, but it seemed a pity to waste them on such mundane use and so she usually reserved them now for occasions such as the dancing class. What she needed now was to buy a smarter pair of shoes for use in the office, and she had in fact identified just such a pair in one of the stores. The shoes were red, and although they had no special coloured lining, they had two large gold ornamental buckles which gave them an air of authority which her other shoes did not have. These were bold shoes, and she would wear them when confronting difficult men, as she occasionally had to do. Men would be mesmerised by the buckles, and this would give her just the advantage that one needed when dealing with men like that.

Although she was reluctant to raise the issue, Mma Makutsi had long been wanting to say something to Mma Ramotswe about the sort of shoes which the older woman wore. Mma Ramotswe was not a flashy dresser, preferring good, reliable skirts and loose blouses, but she nonetheless had a good eye for colour and always looked smart. But when it came to shoes, then it seemed that her dress sense let her down, as she was usually to be seen in a pair of rather shapeless brown shoes with bulges on both sides reflecting the shape of her toes. These shoes were in no sense elegant, and it seemed to Mma Makutsi that they should be replaced by something rather more in keeping with Mma Ramotswe’s position as Botswana’s senior lady private detective.

Mma Ramotswe’s shoes had been touched upon in conversation once before, and the outcome had not been satisfactory. Mma Makutsi had mentioned that there was a shoe sale at one of the shops at the Game Centre, and that in her view there were bargains to be had.

“Perhaps people who have been wearing the same shoes for a long time would be able to find something suitable there,” she remarked casually.

Mma Ramotswe had looked at her. “You mean somebody like me?” she said.

Mma Makutsi had laughed to cover her embarrassment. “No, I was not just thinking of you. But maybe you would like to get yourself some new shoes. You can afford them.”

“But what’s wrong with the shoes I have?” asked Mma Ramotswe. “I have very wide feet. These are very wide shoes and they suit my feet. What would my feet say if I bought a thin pair of fashionable shoes? Surely they would think that something was wrong.”

Mma Makutsi decided to stand her ground. “But you can get wide shoes which look very good,” she said. “They have something for everybody.”

“I am very happy in these shoes,” said Mma Ramotswe. “They never give me any trouble.”

“You might buy some for Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, then,” suggested Mma Makutsi.

“And what is wrong with Mr J.L.B. Matekoni’s shoes?”

Mma Makutsi was beginning to regret raising the subject. There was a great deal wrong with Mr J.L.B. Matekoni’s shoes in her opinion. To begin with, they were covered in oil stains and she had seen the beginnings of a hole in the toe cap of one of them. Like Mma Ramotswe, he had a position in society as the proprietor of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, and shoes in good order were expected of such a person.

When Mma Makutsi did not provide an answer to her question, Mma Ramotswe went on to explain that new shoes would be wasted on Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “There is no point in buying men new shoes,” she said. “They are wasted on them. Men are not interested in shoes. That is very well known. If a man is always thinking about shoes, then there is something wrong with that man.”

“And what do men think about?” asked Mma Makutsi. “If they cannot think about shoes, what can they think about?”

Mma Ramotswe raised an eyebrow. “Men think about ladies a great deal of the time,” she said. “They think about ladies in a disrespectful way. That is because men are made that way, and there is nothing that can be done to change them. Then if they are not thinking about ladies, they are thinking about cattle and cars. And some men think a lot about football too. These are all things that men like to think about.”

On that morning, though, the main topic of conversation was not shoes, nor the foibles of men, but the drama of the tiny white van. Mr Polopetsi had been dismayed to hear about the break-down of the van, to which he felt he owed a debt of gratitude as it was the van that had brought him into contact with Mma Ramotswe and given him his new job. When Mma Ramotswe said that she and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni would shortly be going to retrieve the van and tow it back into Gaborone, he asked whether he could accompany them. Mma Ramotswe agreed, and once Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had explained to the apprentice what needed to be done to the car which had been brought in for servicing, the three of them set off in the truck, leaving Mma Makutsi alone in the office.

The morning had remained fine, and as they drove down past Kgale Hill the sun seemed to paint with gold the trees and rocks on the hillside. Above them the sky was quite empty, apart from a few soaring birds of prey, circling high in the currents of rising warm air; ahead of them the road was clear and straight, a ribbon of black making its way through the grey-green acacia scrub. It was a morning which made one happy to be alive, and to be in that place.

Mr Polopetsi was in a talkative mood, and gave them his views on a speech which Chief Linchwe had recently given in Gaborone and which had given rise to a lot of discussion in the papers. Was Chief Linchwe right in what he had said? Mr Polopetsi thought he was. He had a lot of respect for Chief Linchwe, he said, and he thought that more attention should be paid to his views. Then he moved on to the issue of what should be done about people who dropped litter. There had been some talk about this out at Tlokweng, where he lived, and some people had suggested that those who abandoned litter should be made to go on litter picking-up squads. Either that, or they should be obliged to wear large signs on their backs saying DIRTY PERSON. That would soon stop littering, in Mr Polopetsi’s view.

Mma Ramotswe was not sure about that. “Shame can be a very strong way of encouraging people to behave well,” she said. “Yes, I can see that. But you couldn’t put signs on people saying DIRTY PERSON because that would make others think that those people did not wash. But they might wash quite a lot.”

“I think that signs are a good idea,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “You could put signs on cars too. DANGEROUS DRIVER, for example, or SPEEDER. That would make people drive more safely, I think.”

“But it would look a bit silly, wouldn’t it?” said Mma Ramotswe. “Everybody would eventually have some sort of sign. I would have a sign saying MMA RAMOTSWE on my back, or DETECTIVE perhaps. That would be silly.” And then she thought, but did not say it:And Mma Makutsi would have a sign on her back which said97per cent .

“I did not suggest that,” said Mr Polopetsi, rather peevishly. “All I said was that people who drop litter could have a sign. That is all.”

It was Mr J.L.B. Matekoni who brought the discussion to an end. “We are almost there,” he said. “Is this not the turning that you said you took?”

They slowed down, and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni cautiously headed the truck down the track. By daylight the potholes and rifts in the ground looked far worse than they had at night. It was no surprise to Mma Ramotswe that the tiny white van had been damaged in these conditions; stones, exposed by the movement of soil, reared up in jagged points and at places there jutted onto the track the fallen limbs of trees, plastered now in dried red mud by energetic white ants. Beside the track, watching the truck with mournful eyes, was a small herd of cattle, standing listlessly under the shade of a tree.

“Those cattle are not in good condition,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “Look at the ribs on that one.”

Mma Ramotswe cast an expert eye over the light grey beast and agreed. “It is ill,” she said. “My father would have known what to do about that.”

“Yes, he knew about cattle,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. He had never met Obed Ramotswe, of course, but he knew of his reputation as a fine judge of cattle. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni was always prepared to listen to stories about Obed Ramotswe, although he had heard them all from Mma Ramotswe many times over. He had heard the story of how Obed Ramotswe had met Seretse Khama once when he had come to Mochudi, and had shaken the great man’s hand. He had heard the story of his hat, and how it had once been left near the kgotla and carefully placed on a wall where he might find it again. He had also heard about how the hat had been blown off his head once in a dust storm and had ended up in a tree.

There were many such stories, and he understood just how important they were, and listened with patience and with respect. A life without stories would be no life at all. And stories bound us, did they not, one to another, the living to the dead, people to animals, people to the land?

They drove slowly down the track. After a while, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni turned to Mma Ramotswe. “You said that it happened very close to the turn-off,” he said. “But it must have been further than you thought.”

Mma Ramotswe cast an anxious glance over her shoulder. She was sure that it was about there, at that bend, where the track went off in a different direction. Yes, it must have been that spot, but there was no sign of the van.

She looked at Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “We must stop here,” she said. “I am very sure that it was here.”

Mr Polopetsi, who was sitting between Mr J.L.B. Matekoni and Mma Ramotswe, now leaned forward in his seat. “It has been stolen!” he exclaimed. “Your van has been stolen!”

“We’ll see,” said Mma Ramotswe. She feared that he was right, even though she felt cross with him for saying it. If her van had been stolen, then it was for her to make the announcement, not Mr Polopetsi.

They alighted from the truck and Mma Ramotswe walked over the edge of the track, a few yards behind the place where they had stopped. Looking down at the ground, she saw what she had been looking for, a patch of oil in the sand. The patch measured only six inches or so across, but it was dark and obvious, and there was now no doubt in her mind. She was looking at the place where she had had her last sight of the tiny white van, and it was undoubtedly no longer there.

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni joined her and followed her gaze, down towards the sand. “Ah!” he said, and then, turning to face her, “Ah!” again.

“It has been taken,” she said, her voice cracking. “My van. It is gone now.”

Mr Polopetsi now came to stand beside them. “Somebody must have fixed it and driven it away.”

“Very strange,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “But that means that your engine can’t have seized. It must have been something else. They would not have been able to drive it away if it had seized.”

Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “We will have to go to the police and report it. That is all we can do. They will have driven it far away by now.”

“I’m afraid that you’re right,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni gently. “When a vehicle is stolen, it disappears very quickly. Just like that. It’s gone.”

Mma Ramotswe turned away and began to walk back to the truck, followed by Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. Mr Polopetsi, though, stood where he was.

“We must get back,” called Mr J.L.B. Matekoni over his shoulder.

Mr Polopetsi looked down at the place where the van had been, and then out into the bush beside the track, through the trees and the shrubs and the termite mounds, as if he might see something other than the brown of the grass and the red, red earth and the thorn trees; as if he might hear something other than the screech of the cicadas and the call of birds.

“Leave me here,” he said. “I want to look for clues. You go back to town. I’ll get a minibus from the main road later on. You leave me here.”

Mma Ramotswe turned and stared at him. “There will be no clues,” she said. “They have come and gone. That is all.”

“Just let me try,” said Mr Polopetsi.

“If he wants to,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “There is no harm. There is not much for him to do at the garage this morning.”

They climbed into the truck and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni manoeuvred it back to face up the track. As they drove slowly past him, Mr Polopetsi raised a hand in farewell. Mma Ramotswe noticed that he looked excited, and remarked on this a little later to Mr J.L.B. Matekoni.

“He is playing the detective,” she said. “But there is no harm in that. He is very keen to do some detective work.”

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni laughed. “He is a good man,” he said. “And you did the right thing when you asked him to join us.”

The compliment pleased Mma Ramotswe, and she touched him gently on the forearm. “You have been good to him too,” she said.

They travelled on in silence. A few minutes later, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni glanced at Mma Ramotswe, and he saw that she was crying, silently, but there were tears on her cheeks.

“I am sorry,” she said. “I am sorry. My white van. I loved it very much. It had been my friend for many years.”

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni shifted in his seat. He found it difficult when women became emotional; he was a mechanic, after all, and these things were awkward for mechanics.

“I will find a new one for you,” he said gently. “I will find you a good van.”

Mma Ramotswe said nothing. It was kind of him, she knew, but the finding of a new van was not the point. She wanted only that tiny white van that had driven her all over Botswana. That was all she wanted.