Mma Ramotswe did. “I can see that. You are a very intelligent woman. You have a piece of paper to prove it.” She pointed to the framed diploma above Mma Makutsi’s desk; the words ninety-seven per cent clearly legible even from afar. “Don’t forget to take that, Mma,” she said.
Mma Makutsi looked up at the diploma. “You could easily have got one of those yourself, Mma,” she said.
“But I didn’t,” said Mma Ramotswe. “You did.”
There was silence for a moment.
“Do you want me to stay?” asked Mma Makutsi. There was an edge of uncertainty in her voice now.
Mma Ramotswe opened her hands in a gesture of acceptance. “I don’t think that you should, Mma,” she said. “You need a change. I would love you to stay, but I think that you have decided, haven’t you, that you need a change.”
“Maybe,” said Mma Makutsi.
“But you will come back and see me, won’t you?”
“Of course,” said Mma Makutsi. “And you will come to my wedding, won’t you? You and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni? There will be a seat for you in the front row, Mma Ramotswe. With the aunties.”
There was nothing more to do other than to retrieve the framed diploma from its place on the wall. When it was taken down, there was a white patch where it had been hanging, and they both saw this. Mma Makutsi had been there that long; right from the beginning, really, those humble days in the original office, when chickens came in, uninvited, and pecked at the floor around the desks.
Their words of farewell were polite—the correct ones, as laid down in the old Botswana customs. Tsamaya sentlê: go well. To which the reply was, Sala sentlê: stay well; mere words, of course, but when meant, as now, so powerful. Mma Ramotswe could tell that Mma Makutsi was regretting her decision and did not want to go. It would have been easy to stop this now, to suggest that while Mma Makutsi was replacing the diploma, she, Mma Ramotswe, would start to make the tea. But somehow it seemed too late for that. Sometimes one knew, as Mma Makutsi clearly did, when it was necessary to move on to the next stage of one’s life. When this happened, it was not helpful for others to hold one back. So she allowed Mma Makutsi to leave, did nothing to stop her, and it was not until she had been gone for ten minutes or so that Mma Ramotswe began to weep. She wept for the loss of her friend and colleague, but also for everything else that she had lost in this life, and of which, unexpectedly, she was now by a flood of memories reminded: for her father, that great man, Obed Ramotswe, now late; for the child she had known for such a short time, such a precious time; for Seretse Khama, who had been a father to the entire country and who had made it one of the finest places on this earth; for her childhood. She wanted everything back, as we do sometimes in our irrationality and regret; we want it all back.
CHAPTER SEVEN
HOW DOES ONE BECOME MORE EXCITING?
IF I CAN FIX A CAR, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni told himself, then I can do a simple thing like find out whether a man is seeing a woman. And yet, now that he came to start the enquiry, he was not sure whether it would be quite as straightforward as he had imagined it would be. He could have asked Mma Ramotswe’s advice, but she was preoccupied with the consequences of Mma Makutsi’s departure and he did not want to add to her burdens. As far as the garage was concerned, Charlie still had to work a week’s notice—he had spared him a longer period than that, although he would have been entitled to insist on a month. Fortunately, since it was a relatively quiet period—the school holidays, when people tended not to find fault with their cars and when thoughts of routine servicing were put aside—it would be easy for Mr J.L.B. Matekoni to take a few hours off every day, should the need arise. The younger apprentice was slightly more reliable than Charlie anyway, and could now cope with many routine garage tasks, and Mr Polopetsi was also showing himself to be a natural mechanic. Of course he had aspirations to Mma Makutsi’s job, but Mr J.L.B. Matekoni doubted whether these ambitions would be satisfied. Mma Makutsi had done a lot of filing and typing, and he could not see Mr Polopetsi settling down to these mundane tasks. He wanted to be out and about, looking into things, and what Mma Ramotswe had said about his talents in this respect suggested that she might not be keen for him to do too much of that.
It was all very well being confident, but as you climbed the outside staircase of the President Hotel, on your way to meet the client for your first proper conversation with her, then you felt a certain anxiety. It was not dissimilar to the way you felt when, as an apprentice, you stripped an engine down by yourself for the very first time, decoked it and fitted new piston rings. Would everything fit together again? Would it work? He looked over his shoulder at the scene in the square below. Traders had set up stalls, no more than upturned boxes in many cases, or rugs laid out on the concrete paving, and were selling their wares to passers-by: combs, hair preparations, trinkets, carvings for visitors. In one corner, a small knot of people clustered around a seller of traditional medicines, listening carefully as the gnarled herbalist explained to them the merits of the barks and roots that he had ranged in front of him. He at least knew what he was talking about, thought Mr J.L.B. Matekoni; he at least was doing what he had always done, and doing it well, unlike those who suddenly decide, in mid-life, that they want to become private detectives…
He reached the top of the stairway and entered under the cool canopies of the hotel’s verandah. He looked about him; only a few of the tables were occupied, and he saw Mma Botumile immediately, sitting at the far end, a cup of coffee before her. He stood still for a moment and took a deep breath. She looked up and saw him and gestured to the empty chair at her table.
“I have been waiting, Rra,” she said, looking at her watch. “You said…”
Mr J.L.B. Matekoni consulted his own watch. He had made a point of being on time and had not expected to be censured for lateness. She had said eleven o’clock, had she not? He felt a pang of doubt.
“Ten forty-five,” she said. “You said ten forty-five.”
He was flustered. “I thought I said eleven. I am sorry, Mma. I thought…”
She brushed aside his apology. “It does not matter,” she said. “Where is Mma Ramotswe?”
“She is in the office,” he said. “She has assigned me to this case.”
Mma Botumile, who had been lifting her cup of coffee to her lips, put it down sharply. A small splash of coffee spilled over the rim of the cup and fell on the table. “Why is she not dealing with this?” she asked coldly. “Does she think that I am not important enough for her? Is that it? Well, there are other detectives, I’ll have you know.”
“There aren’t,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni politely. “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency is the only agency. There are no other detectives that I know of.”
Mma Botumile digested this information. She looked Mr J.L.B. Matekoni up and down before she spoke again. “I thought that you were the mechanic.”
“I am,” he said. “But I also do investigations.” He thought for a few moments. “It is useful to have an ordinary occupation while at the same time you conduct enquiries.” He had no idea why this should be so, but it seemed to him to be a reasonable thing to say.
Mma Botumile lifted up her coffee cup again. “Do you know my husband?” she asked.
Mr J.L.B. Matekoni shook his head. “You must tell me about him,” he said. “That is why I wanted to meet you today. I need to know something more about him before I can find out what he is doing.”
A waitress came to the table and looked expectantly at Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. He had not thought about what he would have, but now he felt that tea would be the right thing on a morning like this, which was getting hotter—you could feel it. He was about to order when Mma Botumile waved the waitress away. “We don’t need anything,” she said.