Mma Boko said that this did not surprise her. “When you said you were a private detective, I assumed that. I thought you would be acting for that man’s wife. And that is why I have been happy to speak to you.”
“What man, Mma?”
“That man next door. He has a wife, you see, and he also has that young woman—that shameless young woman.”
Mma Ramotswe coaxed out the facts slowly and skilfully. The flat was rented, Mma Boko told her, by a wealthy businessman—“He has many shops, Mma, and they say that he even owns a small mine somewhere up north.” The businessman was married, and had three children, she believed. “Three innocent children, Mma, and the wife is innocent too—all innocent. But this businessman—I have never actually seen him, Mma, but I have been told all these things about him—this businessman likes young women. Men, you know, Mma, they are all like that. He has set this young woman up in this flat, and he lets her use that silver car too. A young woman—driving around in a car like that, Mma. That is very bad.”
At the end, Mma Ramotswe thanked her for her frankness. Once again, her theory had been proved: if you wanted to get information about something, you had only to ask. Of course, you might get a lot of additional material, as she had just done: information about bad behaviour in supermarkets, for instance, and techniques for resisting temptation. She thought about that again. Something had been said about a reverend, she remembered, and that made her wonder.
* * *
—
BACK IN THE VAN, squashed up against one another once more, each revealed their results.
“Now, Charlie,” Mma Ramotswe began. “You go first. You tell us what you found out.”
“Nothing,” said Charlie. “There was just an old man in the flat. He said that he never saw what was going on outside, as he had lost his glasses six months ago and had not bought a new pair yet. He said that he probably wouldn’t bother, because there was nothing worth looking at any more.”
Mma Makutsi laughed. “Some people lack curiosity, don’t they?”
“He told me that he used to be a train driver,” Charlie went on.
“As long as he had his glasses then,” said Mma Ramotswe. “You wouldn’t want to lose your glasses when you were driving a train. And you, Mma Makutsi—did you find out anything?”
Mma Makutsi had the air of one who harboured private information that she was only too eager to impart. “I found out something very interesting,” she said.
“That’s good,” said Mma Ramotswe, with the air of one who already knew a secret about to be revealed.
“The flat I went to is occupied by a divorced woman,” she said. “She is very lonely, I think, because she was keen to speak to me. I told her I was a detective and she said that she had thought of being a detective herself, but had never done anything about it.”
“Ha!” Charlie interjected. “There are many people who think they can be detectives. I find that when I tell them what I do.”
“Apprentice detective,” Mma Makutsi said.
Charlie ignored this. “I tell them that I am a detective and they say, ‘I could be that too. I’m very good at solving mysteries. I know what’s what.’ That sort of thing.”
“This woman,” said Mma Ramotswe. “What did she tell you, Mma?”
“She told me her life story,” answered Mma Makutsi. “She came from Palapye originally. She went to a commercial college up in Francistown—those are not very high-level places, you know; they do book-keeping and things like that. No shorthand.” She paused and gave a disapproving look, as might any graduate, magna cum laude, of the Botswana Secretarial College. “Anyway, she went to this college place and then came down to Gaborone. Then she met a pilot with an air charter company. You know those planes that go up to Maun and into the Kalahari?”
“A bush pilot,” said Charlie. “They like landing on those little airstrips out in the bush. You have to watch out for those guys.”
Mma Ramotswe looked puzzled. “Why is that, Charlie?”
“They think they’re the tops,” Charlie replied. “They think all the girls are there just for them.”
Mma Ramotswe smiled. The uncharitable might say the same thing about young mechanics, but she would not.
“She met this pilot,” Mma Makutsi continued. “They got married and she was very happy. Then she found out that he had women in all sorts of places. One up in Maun, one in Francistown, even one over the border in Angola. Wherever he landed, there would be a woman waiting for him. Can you imagine that? Can you just imagine it?”
Charlie closed his eyes. Mma Ramotswe thought he looked a bit dreamy, but she said nothing.
“This poor lady has been single since then,” Mma Makutsi went on. “She has a job with one of the banks. She is a book-keeper, and she likes the job, but her boss is a woman who does not like other women to succeed. She will not recommend her for promotion.”
Mma Ramotswe disapproved of that. Removing the ladder by which you had climbed up was a common enough practice—and a particularly nasty one, she felt. “That is very bad,” she said. “Everybody is entitled to a chance. Everybody.”
Charlie was listening. Yes, he thought. Yes.
“She gave me the full story,” Mma Makutsi said. “It was only after she had finished this long tale that I was able to ask her about downstairs. And then, oh my goodness, did I get it all then! She does not like Nametso, Mma Ramotswe. She does not like her.”
“Why?” asked Mma Ramotswe.
“Maybe it’s the Mercedes-Benz,” ventured Charlie. “I have found that many people do not like people with Mercedes-Benzes because they would like one themselves and do not have one.”
Mma Makutsi nodded her agreement. “You’re right there, Charlie. She went on and on about that. She said it was wrong for a young woman like that to have a silver Mercedes-Benz when there are many people much older than she is who have no car at all. She was very cross about that. So I asked her whether she had a car, and she said that her car had broken down and it was going to cost a lot to get it repaired. She said it needed a new gearbox.”
Charlie winced. “That’s not good news. A new gearbox is always expensive. If the gearbox went in this van, Mma Ramotswe…”
Mma Ramotswe made such a gesture as might forfend disaster. “I hope that doesn’t happen, Charlie.”
“I’m not saying it will, Mma,” Charlie replied. “But in a vehicle as old as this, it’s always a possibility.”