The Full Cupboard of Life

CHAPTER ELEVEN

MMA 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 ofbotho, 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 aboutbotho, 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 fiance 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.

“You have packed this well,” he said, making conversation as they drove the short distance to her new house. “I move things for people all the time. But they often have many boxes and plastic bags full of things. Sometimes they also have a grandmother to be moved, and I have to put the old lady in the back of the truck with all the other things.”

“That is no way to treat a grandmother,” said Mma Makutsi. “The grandmother should ride in the front.”

“I agree, Mma,” said the young man. “Those people who put their grandmother in the back of the truck, they will feel sorry when the grandmother is late. They will remember that they put her in the back of the truck, and it will be too late to do anything about it.”

Mma Makutsi replied to this observation civilly, and the rest of the journey was completed in silence. She had the key of the house in the pocket of her blouse and she felt for it from time to time just to reassure herself that it was really there. She was thinking, too, of how she would arrange the furniture-such as it was-and how she might see about a rug for her new bedroom. That was a previously undreamed-of luxury; she had woken every day of her life to a packed earth floor or to plain concrete. Now she might afford a rug which would feel so soft underfoot, like a covering of new grass. She closed her eyes and thought of what lay ahead-the luxury of having her own shower-with hot water!-and the pleasure, the sheer pleasure, of having an extra room in which she could entertain people if she wished. She could invite friends to have a meal with her, and nobody would have to sit on a bed or look at her tin trunk. She could buy a radio and they could listen to music together, Mma Makutsi and her friends, and they would talk about important things, and all the humiliations of the shared stand-pipe would be a thing of the past.

She kept her eyes closed until they were almost there and then opened them and saw the house, which seemed smaller now than she had remembered it, but which was still so beautiful in her eyes, with its sloping roof and its paw-paw trees.

“This is your place, Mma?” asked the driver.

“It’s my house,” said Mma Makutsi, savouring the words.

“You’re lucky,” said the young man. “This is a good place to live. How many pula is the rent? What do you pay?”

Mma Makutsi told him and he whistled. “That is a lot! I could not afford a place like this. I have to live in half a room over that way, half way to Molepolole.”

“That cannot be easy,” said Mma Makutsi.

They drew up in front of the gate, and Mma Makutsi walked down the short path that led to the front door. She had that door, and the part of the house which was lived in by the other tenants was reached by the door at the back. She felt proud that the front door was hers, even if it looked as if it was in need of a coat of paint. That could be dealt with later; what counted now was that she had the key to this door in her hand, paid for by the first month’s rent, and hers by right.

It took the young man very little time to move her possessions into the front room. She thanked him, and gave him a ten-pula tip-overly generous, perhaps, but she was a proper householder now and these things would be expected of her. As she handed over the money, which he took from her with a wide smile, she reflected on the fact that she had never done this before. She had never before been in a position where she had given largesse, and the thought struck her forcibly. It was an unfamiliar, slightly uncomfortable feeling; I am just Mma Makutsi, from Bobonong, and I am giving this young man a ten-pula note. I have more money than he has. I have a better house. I am where he would like to be, but isn’t.

By herself now, in the house, Mma Makutsi moved about her two rooms. She touched the walls; they were solid. She loosened a window latch, letting in a warm breeze for a moment, and then closed the window again. She switched on a light, and a bulb glowed above her; she turned on a tap, and water, fresh, cold water came out and splashed into a stainless steel sink, so polished and shiny that she could see her face reflected at her, the face of a person who was looking at the world with the cautious wonder of ownership, or at least of something close to it, of tenancy.

There was a side door to the house, and she opened this and peered out onto the yard. The paw-paw trees had incipient fruit upon them, which would be ready in a month or so. There were one or two other plants, shrubs that had wilted in the heat but which had the dogged determination of indigenous Botswana vegetation. These would survive even if never watered; they would cling on in the dry ground, making the most of what little moisture they could draw from the soil, tenacious because they lived here in this dry country, and had always lived here. Mma Ramotswe had once described the traditional plants of Botswana as loyal and yes, that was right, thought Mma Makutsi, that is what they are-our old friends, our fellow survivors in this brown land that I love and love so much. Not that she thought about that love very often, but it was there, as it was in the hearts of all Batswana. And that was surely what most people wanted, at the end of the day; to live on the land that they love, and nowhere else; to be where their people had been before them, as long as anybody could remember.

She drew back from the door, and looked about her house again. She did not see the grubby finger marks on the wall, nor the place where the floor had buckled. What she saw was a room with bright curtains and with friends about a table, and herself at the head; what she heard was a pot of water boiling on a stove, to the soft hissing of a flame.