Morality for Beautiful Girls

CHAPTER TWELVE FAMILY BUSINESS

SHE LEFT in the cool of the morning, although the journey would take little more than an hour. Rose had prepared breakfast, and she ate it with the children, sitting on the verandah of her house on Zebra Drive. It was a quiet time, as little traffic passed along their road before seven, when people would start to go to work. There were a few people walking by—a tall man, with shabby trousers, eating a fire-charred corn cob, a woman carrying a baby, strapped to her back with its shawl, the baby’s head nodding in sleep. One of her neighbour’s yellow dogs, lean and undernourished, slunk by, occupied in some mysterious, but quite purposeful canine business. Mma Ramotswe tolerated dogs, but she had a strong distaste for the foul-smelling yellow creatures that lived next door. Their howling at night disturbed her—they would bark at shadows, at the moon, at gusts of wind—and she was sure that they deterred birds, which she did like, from coming to her garden. Every house, except hers, seemed to have its quota of dogs, and occasionally these dogs, overcoming the restrictions of imposed loyalties, would rise above their mutual animosity and walk down the street in a pack, chasing cars and frightening cyclists.

Mma Ramotswe poured bush tea for herself and Motholeli; Puso refused to get used to tea and had a glass of warm milk, into which Mma Ramotswe had stirred two generous spoons of sugar. He had a sweet tooth, possibly as a result of sweet foods which his sister had given him when she was caring for him in that yard up in Francistown. She would try to wean him onto healthier things, but that change would require patience. Rose had made them porridge, which stood in bowls, dark molasses trailed across its surface, and there were sections of paw-paw on a plate. It was a healthy breakfast for a child, thought Mma Ramotswe. What would these children have eaten had they stayed with their people, she wondered? Those people survived on next to nothing; roots dug up from the ground, grubs, the eggs of birds; yet they could hunt as nobody else could, and there would have been ostrich meat and duiker, which people in towns could rarely afford.

She remembered how, when travelling north, she had stopped beside the road to enjoy a flask of tea. The stopping place was a clearing at the side of the road, where a battered sign indicated that one was at that point crossing the Tropic of Capricorn. She had thought herself alone, and had been surprised when there emerged from behind a tree a Mosarwa, or Bushman, as they used to be called. He was wearing a small leather apron and carrying a skin bag of some sort; and had approached her, whistling away in that curious language they use. For a moment she had been frightened; although she was twice his size, these people carried arrows, and poisons, and were naturally very quick.

She had risen uncertainly to her feet, ready to abandon her flask and seek the safety of the tiny white van, but he had simply pointed to his mouth in supplication. Understanding, Mma Ramotswe had passed her cup to him, but he had indicated that it was food, not drink, that he wanted. All that Mma Ramotswe had with her was a couple of egg sandwiches, which he took greedily when offered and bit into hungrily. When he had finished, he licked his fingers and turned away. She watched him as he disappeared into the bush, merging with it as naturally as would a wild creature. She wondered what he had made of the egg sandwich and whether it tasted better to him, or worse, than the offerings of the Kalahari; the rodents and tubers.

The children had belonged to that world, but there could be no going back. That was a life to which one simply could not return, because what had been taken for granted then would seem impossibly hard, and the skills would have gone. Their place now was with Rose, and Mma Ramotswe, in the house on Zebra Drive.

“I am going to have to be away for four or five days,” she explained to them over breakfast. “Rose will be looking after you. You will be all right.”

“That is fine, Mma,” said Motholeli. “I will help her.”

Mma Ramotswe smiled at her encouragingly. She had brought up her little brother, and it was in her nature to help those who were younger than she was. She would be a fine mother eventually, she thought, but then she remembered. Could she be a mother in a wheelchair? It would probably be impossible to bear a child if one could not walk, Mma Ramotswe thought, and even if it were possible, she was not sure that any man would want to marry a woman in a wheelchair. It was very unfair, but you could not hide your face from the truth. It would always be more difficult for that girl, always. Of course there were some good men around who would not think that such a thing mattered, and who would want to marry the girl for the fine, plucky person that she was, but such men were very rare, and Mma Ramotswe had trouble in thinking of many. Or did she? There was Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, of course, who was a very good man—even if temporarily a little bit odd—and there was the Bishop, and there had been Sir Seretse Khama, statesman and Paramount Chief. Dr Merriweather, who ran the Scottish Hospital at Molepolole; he was a good man. And there were others, who were less well-known, now that she came to think of it. Mr Potolani, who helped very poor people and gave away most of the money he had made from his stores; and the man who fixed her roof and who repaired Rose’s bicycle for nothing when he saw that it needed fixing. There were many good men, in fact, and perhaps there would be a good man in due course for Motholeli. It was possible.

That is, of course, if she wanted to find a husband. It was perfectly possible to be happy without a husband, or at least a bit happy. She herself was happy in her single state, but she thought, on balance, that it would be preferable to have a husband. She looked forward to the day when she would be able to make sure that Mr J.L.B. Matekoni was properly fed. She looked forward to the day when, if there was a noise in the night—as there often was these days—it would be Mr J.L.B. Matekoni who would get up to investigate, rather than herself. We do need somebody else in this life, thought Mma Ramotswe; we need a person whom we can make our little god on this earth, as the old Kgatla saying had it. Whether it was a spouse, or a child, or a parent, or anybody else for that matter, there must be somebody who gives our lives purpose. She had always had the Daddy, the late Obed Ramotswe, miner, cattle farmer, and gentleman. It had given her pleasure to do things for him in his lifetime, and now it was a pleasure to do things for his memory. But the memory of a father went only so far.

Of course, there were those who said that none of this required marriage. They were right, to an extent. You did not have to be married to have somebody in your life, but then you would have no guarantee of permanence. Marriage itself did not offer that, but at least both people said that they wanted a lifelong union. Even if they proved to be wrong, at least they had tried. Mma Ramotswe had no time for those who decried marriage. In the old days, marriage had been a trap for women, because it gave men most of the rights and left women with the duties. Tribal marriage had been like that, although women acquired respect and status as they grew older, particularly if they were the mothers of sons. Mma Ramotswe did not support any of that, and thought that the modern notion of marriage, which was meant to be a union of equals, was a very different thing for a woman. Women had made a very bad mistake, she thought, in allowing themselves to be tricked into abandoning a belief in marriage. Some women thought that this would be a release from the tyranny of men, and in a way it had been that, but then it had also been a fine chance for men to behave selfishly. If you were a man and you were told that you could be with one woman until you got tired of her and then you could easily go on to a younger one, and all the time nobody would say that your behaviour was bad—because you were not committing adultery and so what wrong were you doing?—then that would suit you very well indeed.

“Who is doing all the suffering these days?” Mma Ramotswe had asked Mma Makutsi one day, as they sat in their office and waited for a client to appear. “Is it not women who have been left by their men going off with younger girls? Is that not what happens? A man gets to forty-five and decides that he has had enough. So he goes off with a younger woman.”

“You are right, Mma,” said Mma Makutsi. “It is the women of Botswana who are suffering, not the men. The men are very happy. I have seen it with my own eyes. I saw it at the Botswana Secretarial College.”

Mma Ramotswe waited for more details.

“There were many glamorous girls at the College,” went on Mma Makutsi. “These were the ones who did not do very well. They got fifty percent, or just over. They used to go out three or four nights a week, and many of them would meet older men, who would have more money and a nice car. These girls did not care that these men were married. They would go out with these men and dance in the bars. Then, what would happen, Mma?”

Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “I can imagine.”

Mma Makutsi took off her glasses and polished them on her blouse. “They would tell these men to leave their wives. And the men would say that this was a good idea, and they would go off with these girls. And there would be many unhappy women who now would not be able to get another man because the men only go for young glamorous girls and they do not want an older woman. That is what I saw happening, Mma, and I could give you a list of names. A whole list.”

“You do not need to,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I have got a very long list of unhappy ladies. Very long.”

“And how many unhappy men do you know?” went on Mma Makutsi. “How many men do you know who are sitting at home and thinking what to do now that their wife has gone off with a younger man? How many, Mma?”

“None,” said Mma Ramotswe. “Not one.”

“There you are,” said Mma Makutsi. “Women have been tricked. They have tricked us, Mma. And we walked into their trap like cattle.”

THE CHILDREN dispatched to school, Mma Ramotswe packed her small brown suitcase and began the drive out of town, out past the breweries and the new factories, the new low-cost suburb, with its rows of small, breeze-block houses, over the railway line which led to Francistown and Bulawayo, and onto the road that would lead her to the troubled place that was her destination. The first rains had come, and the parched brown veld was turning green, giving sweet grass to the cattle and the wandering herds of goats. The tiny white van had no radio—or no radio that worked—but Mma Ramotswe knew songs that she could sing, and she sang them, the window open, the crisp air of morning in her lungs, the birds flying up from the side of the road, plumage glistening; and above her, empty beyond emptiness, that sky that went on for miles and miles, the palest of blues.

She had felt uneasy about her mission, largely because what she was about to do, she felt, was a breach of the fundamental principles of hospitality. You do not go into a house, as a guest, under false colours; and this was precisely what she was doing. Certainly, she was the guest of the father and mother, but even they did not know the true purpose of her visit. They were receiving her as one to whom their son owed a favour; whereas she was really a spy. She was a spy in a good cause, naturally, but that did not change the fact that her goal was to penetrate the family to find out a secret.

But now, in the tiny white van, she decided to put moral doubts aside. It was one of those situations where there were sound points to be made on both sides. She had decided that she would do it, because it was, on balance, better to act out a lie than to allow a life to be lost. Doubts should now be put away and the goal pursued wholeheartedly. There was no point in agonising over the decision you had made and wondering whether it was the right one. Besides, moral scruples would prevent the part from being played with conviction, and this might show. It would be like an actor questioning the part that he was playing mid-role.

She passed a man driving a mule cart, and waved. He took a hand from the rein and waved back, as did his passengers on the cart, two elderly women, a younger woman, and a child. They would be going out to the lands, thought Mma Ramotswe; a little bit late, perhaps, as they should have ploughed by the time that the first rains came, but they would sow their seed in time and they would have corn, and melons, and beans, perhaps by harvest time. There were several sacks on the cart, and these would contain the seed and the family’s food, as well, while they were out on the lands. The women would make porridge and if the boys were lucky they might catch something for the pot—a guinea fowl would make a delicious stew for the whole family.

Mma Ramotswe saw the cart and the family retreating in the rearview mirror, as if they were going back into the past, getting smaller and smaller. One day people would no longer do this; they would no longer go out to the lands for the planting, and they would buy their food in stores, as people did in town. But what a loss for the country that would be; what friendship, and solidarity, and feeling for the land would be sacrificed if that were to happen. She had gone out to the lands as a girl, travelling with her aunts, and had stayed there while the boys had been sent to the cattle posts, where they would live for months in almost complete isolation, supervised by a few old men. She had loved the time at the lands, and had not been bored. They had swept the yards and woven grass; they had weeded the melon patches and told one another long stories about events that never happened, but could happen, perhaps, in another Botswana, somewhere else.

And then, when it had rained, they had cowered in the huts and heard the thunder roll above the land and smelled the lightning when it came too close, that acrid smell of burned air. When the rains had let up, they had gone outside and waited for the flying ants, which would emerge from their holes in the moistened ground and which could be picked up before they took flight, or plucked from the air as they began their journey, and eaten there and then, for the taste of butter.

She passed Pilane, and glanced down the road to Mochudi, to her right. This was a good place for her, and a bad one too. It was a good place, because it was the village of her girlhood; a bad place because right there, not far from the turnoff, was the place where a path crossed the railroad and her mother had died on that awful night, when the train had struck her. And although Precious Ramotswe was only a baby, that had been the shadow across her life; the mother whom she could not remember.

Now she was getting close to her destination. She had been given exact directions, and the gate was there, in the cattle fence, exactly where she had been told it would be. She drew off the road and got out to deal with the gate. Then, setting off on the dirt track that led west, she made her way to the small compound of houses that she could see about a mile or so distant, tucked amongst a cover of bush and overlooked by the tower of a metal windmill. This was a substantial farm, thought Mma Ramotswe, and she felt a momentary pang. Obed Ramotswe would have loved to have had a place like this, but although he had done well with his cattle, he had never been quite rich enough to have a large farm of this type. This would be six thousand acres, at least; maybe more.

The farm compound was dominated by a large, rambling house, topped by a red tin roof and surrounded on all sides by shady verandahs. This was the original farmhouse, and it had been encircled, over the years, by further buildings, two of which were houses themselves. The farmhouse was framed on either side by a luxuriant growth of purple-flowered bougainvillaea, and there were paw-paw trees behind it and to one side. An effort had been made to provide as much shade as possible—for not far to the west, perhaps just a bit farther than the eye could see, the land changed and the Kalahari began. But here, still, there was water, and the bush was good for cattle. Indeed, not too far to the east, the Limpopo began, not much of a river at that point, but capable of flowing in the rainy season.

There was a truck parked up against an outbuilding, and Mma Ramotswe left the tiny white van there. There was an enticing place under the shade of one of the largest trees, but it would have been rude of Mma Ramotswe to choose such a spot, which would be likely to be the parking place of a senior member of the family.

She left her suitcase on the passenger seat beside her and walked towards the gate that gave access to the front yard of the main house. She called out; it would have been discourteous to barge in without an invitation. There was no reply, and so she called out again. This time, a door opened and a middle-aged woman came out, drying her hands on her apron. She greeted Mma Ramotswe politely and invited her to come into the house.

“She is expecting you,” she said. “I am the senior maid here. I look after the old woman. She has been waiting for you.”

It was cool under the eaves of the verandah, and even cooler in the dim interior of the house. It took Mma Ramotswe’s eyes a moment or two to get accustomed to the change in light, and at first there seemed to be more shadows that shapes; but then she saw the straight-backed chair on which the old woman was sitting, and the table beside her with the jug of water and the teapot.

They exchanged greetings, and Mma Ramotswe curtsied to the old woman. This pleased her hostess, who saw that here was a woman who understood the old ways, unlike those cheeky modern women from Gaborone who thought they knew everything and paid no attention to the elders. Ha! They thought they were clever; they thought they were this and that, doing men’s jobs and behaving like female dogs when it came to men. Ha! But not here, out in the country, where the old ways still counted for something; and certainly not in this house.

“You are very kind to have me to stay here, Mma. Your son is a good man, too.”

The old woman smiled. “No, Mma. That is all right. I am sorry to hear that you are having troubles in your life. These troubles that seem big, big in town are small troubles when you are out here. What matters out here? The rain. The grass for the cattle. None of the things that people are fretting over in town. They mean nothing when you are out here. You’ll see.”

“It is a nice place,” said Mma Ramotswe. “It is very peaceful.”

The old woman looked thoughtful. “Yes, it is peaceful. It has always been peaceful, and I would not want that to change.” She poured out a glass of water and passed it to Mma Ramotswe.

“You should drink that, Mma. You must be very thirsty after your journey.”

Mma Ramotswe took the glass, thanked her, and put it to her lips. As she did so, the old woman watched her carefully.

“Where are you from, Mma?” she said. “Have you always lived in Gaborone?”

Mma Ramotswe was not surprised by the question. This was a polite way of finding out where allegiances lay. There were eight main tribes in Botswana—and some smaller ones—and although most younger people did not think these things should be too important, for the older generation they counted a great deal. This woman, with her high status in tribal society, would be interested in these matters.

“I am from Mochudi,” she said. “That is where I was born.”

The old woman seemed visibly to relax. “Ah! So you are Kgatla, like us. Which ward did you live in?”

Mma Ramotswe explained her origins, and the old woman nodded. She knew that headman, yes, and she knew his cousin, who was married to her brother’s wife’s sister. Yes, she thought that she had met Obed Ramotswe a long time ago, and then, dredging into memory, she said, “Your mother is late, isn’t she? She was the one who was killed by a train when you were a baby.”

Mma Ramotswe was mildly surprised, but not astonished, that she should know this. There were people who made it their business to remember the affairs of the community, and this was obviously one. Today they called them oral historians, she believed; whereas in reality, they were old women who liked to remember the things that interested them most: marriages, deaths, children. Old men remembered cattle.

Their conversation went on, the old woman slowly and subtly extracting from Mma Ramotswe the full story of her life. She told her about Note Mokoti, and the old woman shook her head in sympathy, but said that there were many men like that and that women should look out for them.

“My family chose my husband for me,” she said. “They started negotiations, although they would not have pressed the matter if I had said that I didn’t like him. But they did the choosing and they knew what sort of man would be good for me. And they were right. My husband is a very fine husband, and I have given him three sons. There is one who is very interested in counting cattle, which is his hobby; he is a very clever man, in his way. Then there is the one you know, Mma, who is a very big man in the Government, and then there is the one who lives here. He is a very good farmer and has won prizes for his bulls. They are all fine men. I am proud.”

“And have you been happy, Mma?” asked Mma Ramotswe. “Would you change your life at all if somebody came and said: here is some medicine to change your life. Would you do it?”

“Never,” said the old woman. “Never. Never. God has given me everything a person could ask for. A good husband. Three strong sons. Strong legs that even today can take me walking five, six miles without any complaint. And you see here, look. All my teeth are still in my head. Seventy-six years and no teeth gone. My husband is the same. Our teeth will last until we are one hundred. Maybe longer.”

“That is very lucky,” said Mma Ramotswe. “Everything is very good for you.”

“Almost everything,” said the old woman.

Mma Ramotswe waited. Was she due to say something more? Perhaps she might reveal something she had seen her daughter-in-law do. Perhaps she had seen her preparing the poison, or had word of it somehow, but all she said was: “When the rains come, I find that my arms ache in the wet air. Here, and just here. For two months, three months, I have very sore arms that make it difficult to do any sewing. I have tried every medicine, but nothing works. So I think, if this is all that God has sent me to carry in this life, then I am still a very lucky woman.”

THE MAID who had shown Mma Ramotswe in was summoned to take her to her room, which was at the back of the house. It was simply furnished, with a patchwork bedcover and a framed picture of Mochudi Hill on the wall. There was a table, with a crocheted white doily, and a small chest of drawers in which clothes could be stored.

“There is no curtain in this room,” said the maid. “But nobody ever goes past this window and you will be private here, Mma.”

She left Mma Ramotswe to unpack her clothes. There would be lunch at twelve o’clock, the maid explained, and until then she should entertain herself.

“There is nothing to do here,” said the maid, adding, wistfully, “This is not Gaborone, you know.”

The maid started to leave, but Mma Ramotswe prolonged the conversation. In her experience, the best way of getting somebody to talk was to get them to speak about themselves. This maid would have views, she felt; she was clearly not a stupid woman, and she spoke good, well-enunciated Setswana.

“Who else lives here, Mma?” she asked. “Are there other members of the family?”

“Yes,” said the maid. “There are other people. There is their son and his wife. They have three sons, you see. One who has got a very small head and who counts cattle all day, all the time. He is always out at the cattle post and he never comes here. He is like a small boy, you see, and that is why he stays with the herdboys out there. They treat him like one of them, although he is a grown man. That is one. Then there is the one in Gaborone, where he is very important, and the one here. Those are the sons.”

“And what do you think of those sons, Mma?”

It was a direct question and probably posed prematurely, which was risky; the woman could become suspicious at such prying. But she did not; instead she sat down on the bed.

“Let me tell you, Mma,” she began. “That son who is out at the cattle post is a very sad man. But you should hear the way that his mother talks about him. She says he is clever! Clever! Him! He is a little boy, Mma. It is not his fault, but that is what he is. The cattle post is the best place for him, but they should not say that he is clever. That is just a lie, Mma. It is like saying that there is rain in the dry season. There isn’t.”

“No,” said Mma Ramotswe. “That is true.”

The maid barely acknowledged her intervention before continuing. “And then that one in Gaborone; when he comes out here he makes trouble for everybody. He asks us all sorts of questions. He pokes his nose into everything. He even shouts at his father, would you believe it? But then the mother shouts at him and puts him in his place. He may be a big man in Gaborone, but here he is just the son and he should not shout at his elders.”

Mma Ramotswe was delighted. This was exactly the sort of maid she liked to interview.

“You are right, Mma,” she said. “There are too many people shouting at other people these days. Shout. Shout. You hear it all the time. But why do you think he shouts? Is it just to clear his voice?”

The maid laughed. “He has a big voice, that one! No, he shouts because he says that there is something wrong in this place. He says that things are not being done properly. And then he says …” She lowered her voice. “And then he says that the wife of his brother is a bad woman. He said that to the father, in so many words. I heard him. People think that maids don’t hear, but we have ears the same as anybody. I heard him say that. He said wicked things about her.”

Mma Ramotswe raised an eyebrow. “Wicked things?”

“He says that she is sleeping with other men. He says that when they have their firstborn it will not be of this house. He says that their sons will belong to other men and different blood will get this farm. That’s what he says.”

Mma Ramotswe was silent. She looked out of her window. There was bougainvillaea directly outside, and its shadow was purple. Beyond it, the tops of the thorn trees, stretching out to the low hills on the horizon; a lonely land, at the beginning of the emptiness.

“And do you think that’s true, Mma? Is there any truth in what he says about that woman?”

The maid crumpled up her features. “Truth, Mma? Truth? That man does not know what truth means. Of course it is not true. That woman is a good woman. She is the cousin of my mother’s cousin. All the family, all of them, are Christians. They read the Bible. They follow the Lord. They do not sleep with other men. That is one thing which is true.”