The Kalahari Typing School For Men

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

YOU WERE very brave back there,” said Mma Ramotswe to Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni as they travelled back from the orphan farm. “It is not easy to stand up to Mma Potokwani, and you did it.”

Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni smiled. “I didn’t think I would have the courage. But when I looked at the old pump, and heard it make those strange sounds, I decided that I just would not do it again. After all those repairs. There is a time to let a machine go.”

“I watched her face as you told her,” said Mma Ramotswe. “She was very surprised. It was as if one of the children had spoken back to her. She had not expected it.”

In spite of her surprise, though, Mma Potokwani had given in remarkably quickly. There had been a halfhearted attempt to persuade Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni to change his mind and to fix the pump-“just for one last time”-but when she realised that he was adamant, she had switched to the question of who could be persuaded to pay for a new one. There was a general-purpose fund, of course, which was more than capable of footing the bill, but this would be drawn upon only when there was no other way of meeting the cost. Somewhere there would be somebody who might be persuaded that it would be an honour to have a pump named after them; that was always a good way of getting funds. Some people liked to do good by stealth, discreetly and anonymously providing funds, but others liked to do their charitable works in the glare of as much publicity as Mma Potokwani could arrange. This did not matter, of course: the important thing was to get the pump.

Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni had not left the orphan farm without making a positive contribution. Although he had brought bad tidings about the pump, he had nonetheless spent an hour attending to a timing problem in the engine of the old blue minivan used to transport the orphans. Again, this could not be kept going indefinitely, and he wondered when he would have to announce its end to Mma Potokwani, but for the time being he could keep it on the road with judicious tinkering.

While he worked on the van, Mma Ramotswe and Mma Potokwani had occupied themselves by visiting some of the housemothers. Mma Gotofede had been consulted about her recipe for fruitcake and had written it out for Mma Ramotswe and given her one or two tips on how to ensure the right consistency and moisture level. Then they had seen the new laundry, and Mma Potokwani had demonstrated the efficiency of the steam irons which they had recently acquired.

“The children must always look neat,” she had explained. “A neat child is happier than a scruffy child. That is a well-known fact.”

It had been a good visit, and in the truck on the way back, after they had discussed the pump, Mma Ramotswe judged the time right to raise with Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni the issue of Puso’s behaviour. It would be a difficult message to convey. She did not want Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni to think that she was criticising him, or that Mma Potokwani had done so, but she had to encourage him to play a greater role in the boy’s life.

“I talked to her about Puso,” she ventured. “She was sorry to hear that he had been difficult.”

“Was she surprised?” he asked.

Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “Not at all. She said that boys are difficult to raise. She said that men need to spend time with boys, to help them. If they do not, then boys can be confused and difficult. Somebody must spend more time with Puso.”

“Me?” he said. “She must mean me.”

Mma Ramotswe wondered whether he was angry; it was hard to tell with Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. She had seen him angry on one or two occasions, but he had controlled himself so well that one might have missed it.

“I suppose so,” she said. “She suggested that you could do more things with him. In that way he would think of you more as his father. It would be good for him.”

“Oh,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “I see. She must think that I am not a good father, then.”

Mma Ramotswe did not like to lie. She was a stout defender of the truth, but there were occasions on which a slight embroidering of reality was necessary in order to save another from hurt.

“Not at all,” she said. “Mma Potokwani said that you were the best father that boy could ever wish for. That’s what she said.”

It was not, but it could have been said by Mma Potokwani. If she did not think this, then why had she been so keen to send the children to him in the first place? No, this was not a lie; it was an interpretation.

It had the hoped-for effect. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni beamed with pleasure and scratched his head. “That was a kind thing for her to say. But I shall try to do more with him, as she suggests. I shall take him for rides in the truck.”

“A good idea,” said Mma Ramotswe quickly. “And maybe you can play some games with him. Football, perhaps.”

“Yes,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “I shall do all these things, starting this very evening. I shall do them.”

When they returned to Zebra Drive, while Mma Ramotswe prepared the evening meal, Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni took Puso for a ride in his truck to look at the dam, taking him onto his lap and allowing him to steer the wheel as they bumped along a back track. On the way home, they stopped at a café for potato chips, which they ate in the cab of the truck. Then they returned, and Mma Ramotswe noticed that both were smiling.

THE NEXT day at the shared premises of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency and Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, everybody’s mood, if not elevated, was at least buoyant. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni felt considerable satisfaction at having prompted the purchase of a new pump at the orphan farm, and was happy, too, with the progress he had made in communicating with Puso. Mma Ramotswe shared his pleasure in this and was further cheered when the morning post brought three cheques from clients who had been stalling in their payments. The younger apprentice had about him an air of quiet serenity, as if he had seen a vision, thought Mma Ramotswe, although she could not work out what could have made him look so pleased with himself. The older apprentice was strangely silent-although in no sense grumpy. Something had happened to him, too, thought Mma Ramotswe, although again she could not imagine what it was, unless, in his case, it had been the discovery of some breathtakingly beautiful girl who had stunned him into silence and contemplation.

The younger apprentice would very much have liked to spread the good news of the miracle which they had witnessed at Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors the previous afternoon. He could not do this-not at the garage at least-because of the compromising circumstances in which the miracle had occurred. To announce that prayer had caused the malfunctioning hydraulics to work would entail admitting that they had wrongfully used the equipment in the first place. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni would probably not be so interested in how the car came down as he would be in how it came to be up in the air, and this would lead to a reprimand, at the very least, or possibly to a docking of pay, which he was entitled to do under their apprenticeship contract in the event of serious wrongdoing. So the apprentice could not announce that something special had happened, nor claim the credit for having caused this event. He would have to wait until the following Sunday, when he would be able to reveal to the congregation at the church, to the brothers and sisters who would be interested in this sort of thing, that prayer had brought immediate and concrete results.

The older apprentice was naturally sceptical about such things, but he had been astonished by what appeared to be a clear connection between a prayed-for event and the event itself. If his younger colleague could do this, then did it mean that everything else that he did was equally valid? This had alarming implications, as it meant that he would have to pay some attention to his predictions of divine wrath should he, Charlie, not change his ways. That was a sobering thought.

Mma Ramotswe also noticed that there was something different about Mma Makutsi. It could have been that she had new shoes and a new dress, both of which could do a great deal for a person’s mood, but she thought that there was something more to it than that. What struck her was a certain demureness that appeared to have crept into her manner, and for this there was usually only one explanation.

“You are happy today, Mma,” she said casually, as she entered the details of the cheques in her cash-received book.

Mma Makutsi made an airy movement with her right hand. “It is a nice day. We have received those cheques.”

Mma Ramotswe smiled. “Yes,” she said. “But we have received cheques before, and they have not had this effect on you. There is something more, isn’t there?”

“You’re the detective,” said Mma Makutsi playfully. “You tell me what it is.”

“You have met a man,” said Mma Ramotswe plainly. “That is how people behave when they have met a man.”

Mma Makutsi seemed deflated. “Oh,” she said.

“There,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I knew it. I am very pleased, Mma. I hope that he is a nice man.”

“Oh he is,” enthused Mma Makutsi. “He is a very handsome man. With a moustache. He has a moustache and his hair is parted in the middle.”

“That is interesting,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I like moustaches, too.” She wondered whether Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni would be persuaded to grow a moustache, but decided that it was unlikely. She had heard him talking to the apprentices about the need for mechanics to be clean-shaven; it was something to do with grease, she imagined.

She waited for Mma Makutsi to enlarge on her description, but she sat at her desk, busying herself with a sheaf of garage bills. So she returned to her cash book.

“He has a very nice smile, too,” Mma Makutsi suddenly added. “That is one of the nice things about him.”

“Oh yes?” said Mma Ramotswe. “And have you been out dancing with him? Men with moustaches can be good dancers.”

Mma Makutsi lowered her voice. “We haven’t actually been out together yet,” she said. “But that will happen soon. Maybe tonight.”

MR. BERNARD Selelipeng was the first student to arrive that evening, knocking at the door of the hall a good twenty minutes before the class was due to start. Mma Makutsi had already been there for half an hour, setting out the papers for the evening’s exercises and touching up the chalked-in finger diagram on the blackboard. A group of Boy Scouts had met in the hall that afternoon, and one of the Scouts had traced finger marks over Mma Makutsi’s drawing of the typewriter keyboard, necessitating some repairs to the third finger on the right hand and the little finger on the left.

“It’s only me, Mma,” he said on entering the room. “Bernard Selelipeng.”

She looked up and smiled at him. She noticed the gleaming parting in his hair and the neat buttoned-down collar. She saw, too, his highly polished shoes; another good sign, in her view, and one which suggested that he would appreciate her own new green shoes.

She smiled at him as he made his way over to his desk, to which she had earlier returned his essay. As he picked up the piece of paper and began to read her pencilled-in comment, she purported to concentrate on the pile of papers on her table, but she was watching for his reaction.

He looked up, and she knew immediately that she had done the right thing. Folding up his essay, he crossed the room to stand before her.

“I hope that you did not think I was being rude, Mma,” he said. “I wanted to write the truth, and that was the truth.”

“Of course I did not think you rude,” she said. “I was happy to read what you had written.”

“And your reply is just what I was hoping for,” he said. “I would like to ask you to come for a drink with me after the class tonight. Will you be free?”

Of course she would, and for the rest of the class, although she was outwardly occupied with the teaching of typing, she could not think of anything other than Mr. Bernard Selelipeng, and it was difficult to address questions to the class as a whole rather than to the smiling, elegant man seated in the middle of the second row. There were so many questions that had to be answered. What was his job, for example? Where was he from? How old was he? She guessed that he was in his mid- to late thirties, but it was always difficult to tell with men.

At the end, when the class had been dismissed and everybody except for Bernard Selelipeng and Mma Makutsi had dispersed, he helped her to tidy up and to lock the hall. Then he showed her to his car, the possession of which was another good sign, and they drove off in the direction of a bar which he said he knew at the edge of the town, on the Francistown Road. It was an intensely pleasurable feeling for her, sitting in the passenger seat of his car, like any other of those fortunate women who were driven about by their husbands and lovers with such an air of security and possession. It seemed to her to feel completely right, that she should be transported in this way, a handsome, moustachioed man at the wheel. How quickly, too, one might become accustomed to this; no long walk to work across dusty paths, trodden by so many other feet, nor any frustrating wait for the crowded and stuffy minibuses which would ferry one about in bone-shaking discomfort for a pula or two.

Bernard Selelipeng glanced at her and flashed his smile in her direction. The smile, she thought, was his most attractive feature. It was a warm, inviting smile, of the sort that one could imagine living with. A husband who scowled all the time would be worse than no husband at all, but a man who smiled like that would turn his wife weak at the knees every day.

They arrived at the bar. Mma Makutsi had seen it before, from the road, but had never been in. It was an expensive place, she had heard, where you could have a meal, too, if you wished. There was music playing in the background as they went in, and a waiter quickly appeared to take their order. Bernard Selelipeng ordered a beer, and Mma Makutsi, who never drank alcohol, ordered a soft drink with ice.

Bernard Selelipeng knocked his glass gently against hers and smiled again. They had not made much conversation in the car, and now he asked her politely where she lived and what she did for a living during the day. Mma Makutsi was not sure whether she should tell him about the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, as she was not certain whether he would be inhibited by her being a detective, even if only an assistant detective, and so she confined herself to mentioning her role as the assistant manager of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors.

“And what about you, Rra?” she asked. “What do you do yourself?”

“I work in the diamond office,” he said. “I am a personnel manager there.”

This impressed Mma Makutsi. Jobs with the diamond company were well paid and secure, and it was a good thing, she thought, to be a personnel manager, which had a modern ring to it. But even as she thought this, she wondered why a personnel manager, handsome, of an interesting age, and in possession of his own car, should be unattached. He must be one of the most eligible men in Gaborone, and yet he was paying attention to her, Mma Makutsi, who was not necessarily the most glamorous of ladies. He could go to the Botswana Secretarial College, park outside the drive, and pick up any number of fashionable girls much younger than herself. And yet he did not. She glanced at his left hand as he lifted his glass of beer to his mouth. There was no ring.

“I live by myself,” said Bernard Selelipeng. “I have a flat in one of those blocks at the edge of the village. That’s not far from your garage. That’s where I live.”

“They are very nice flats,” said Mma Makutsi.

“I would like to show you my place someday,” said Bernard Selelipeng. “I think you would like it.”

“But why do you live by yourself?” asked Mma Makutsi. “Most people would get lonely living by themselves.”

“I am divorced,” said Bernard Selelipeng. “My wife went away with another man and took our children with her. That is why I am by myself.”

Mma Makutsi was astonished that any woman could leave a man like this, but of course she might well have been the flashy type, and they were notorious. She imagined that such a wife could have her head turned by a richer, more successful man-although Bernard Selelipeng was clearly successful.

They made easy conversation for several hours. He was witty and entertaining, and she laughed at his descriptions of some of his colleagues in the diamond office. She told him about the apprentices, and he laughed at them. Then, shortly before ten o’clock, he looked at his watch and announced that he would be happy to run her home, as he had to be at an early meeting the following morning and did not wish to be too late. So they went back to the car and drove back through the night. Outside the house in which she rented her room, he stopped the car but did not turn off the engine. Again this was a good sign.

“Good night,” he said, touching her gently on the shoulder. “I will see you at the class tomorrow.”

She smiled at him encouragingly. “You have been very kind,” she said. “Thank you for this evening.”

“I cannot wait for us to go out again,” he said. “There is a film I would like to see at the cinema. Perhaps we can go to that.”

“I would like that very much,” said Mma Makutsi.

She watched him drive down the road, the rear red lights of his car disappearing in the darkness. She sighed; he was so kind, so gentlemanly, rather like a glamorous version of Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. What a coincidence it was that she and Mma Ramotswe should both have found such good men, when there were so many charlatans and deceivers about.