She paused, and then raised an admonitory finger. “Or, if the person has been a very hopeless employee and the employer then wants to get rid of him, then they write a glowing reference. This is to make sure that they get the job and go. What do they say, Mma? Don’t they say: ‘Make sure that the road is always clear for your enemy to leave’? There is a lot of truth in these sayings, Mma—a lot of truth.”
Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “It must be very difficult for you, Mma. Because you don’t want to choose somebody just because she is a distant relative or something like that…”
Had Mma Ramotswe been looking at Mma Potokwane at the time, she would have noticed her friend squirming slightly at this; it was only a brief reaction, though, and there might have been nothing to it. A squirm may really be a shifting of weight, a momentary compromise with the gravity that eventually defeats us all.
“No,” said Mma Potokwane, perhaps more firmly than might have been necessary, “one would not want to make an appointment on that basis. You should not give people a job just because you know their parents or because they are from the same village as you. No, you must not do that.”
“No,” said Mma Ramotswe. “You must not.”
They were silent for a moment. Then Mma Ramotswe said, “So how did you choose that lady, Mma? How did you choose Mma Kentse?”
Mma Potokwane drained her cup and reached out for the teapot. “It was very difficult, Mma,” she said. “I had a shortlist of five ladies—all of them with the right experience. Three had worked in the hospital, and two had worked in a school. They all had their school-leaving certificate and they all had brought up their own children. They were all members—or had been members—of a choir too; it is a good thing, I find, if the housemother can sing to the children.”
Mma Ramotswe agreed. Singing to children was one of the traditions that she most wanted preserved. It was what the grandmothers had always done, and it lay, she felt, at the heart of what it was to be brought up in Botswana. It was the blanket, in a sense, in which a child was wrapped—that blanket of love that a nation should provide. It might seem to be a small matter, but it was in reality a very big thing indeed.
“So how did you choose?”
Mma Potokwane hesitated before replying. “You are a traditionally built lady, Mma,” she said. “As am I. We are both traditionally built. So…”
Mma Ramotswe leaned forward in anticipation. “So you…”
“So I chose the most traditionally built lady of the five,” said Mma Potokwane.
Mma Ramotswe let out a whoop of delight. “You didn’t, Mma!”
Mma Potokwane nodded. She was smiling now. “I did, Mma. And I did so because I felt that the most traditionally built lady would be the happiest. And the happiest lady would make the children happy, which is what the job of housemother is all about. The children love a traditionally built housemother—such a lady has more acreage, so to speak, Mma, for the children to climb on. Her lap will be big enough for many children to sit on at the same time, and…” She searched for additional reasons.
“And her heart will be traditionally built,” said Mma Ramotswe. “She will have a large heart.”
“There you are,” concluded Mma Potokwane. She looked at Mma Ramotswe enquiringly. “Do you think I did the right thing, Mma?”
“Of course you did,” said Mma Ramotswe, who was sure of her response. It was not just that she was a traditionally built person speaking on behalf of the ranks of traditionally built people; it seemed to her that any reasonable person would agree with Mma Potokwane’s reasoning. So she repeated her reassurance to her friend that she had done the right thing, and they moved on to the next subject, which was a conversation that Mma Potokwane had had with Mr. Polopetsi. This gave rise to a rather different issue altogether.
“I had a visit from Mr. Polopetsi,” said Mma Potokwane. “It was a bit of a surprise, as I don’t really know him all that well.”
Mma Ramotswe raised an eyebrow. “Nothing official, Mma? Nothing to do with his work for the agency?”
Mma Potokwane shook her head. “No, nothing to do with business—or not your agency’s business. It was more personal.”
Mma Ramotswe wondered what personal business Mr. Polopetsi might have with Mma Potokwane. Mma Makutsi had always hinted that there was a side to Mr. Polopetsi that they knew nothing about, and she was right: they knew little about Mr. Polopetsi’s personal life, about his friends, about the place he originally came from.
“He stopped by a couple of weeks ago,” continued Mma Potokwane. “He sat there—in the chair you’re on—and asked me whether I was financially secure.”
Mma Ramotswe frowned. “How strange.”
“Yes, I thought so. So I told him that I got a good salary here and that my husband was doing reasonably well. I said that we were far from being rich, but we did not want for anything.” She paused. “Mind you, I wish we could afford a more reliable car, but then who doesn’t wish for that? Can you name one single person who doesn’t want a more reliable car?”
Mma Ramotswe laughed. “I’m happy with my van. It is very old…”
“But very reliable, Mma. I have never seen it break down—ever.”
“No, it does not break down. It just goes on and on. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni would like me to get rid of it.”
“You couldn’t do that. It would be like getting rid of your aunt. You cannot get rid of these important things just like that.”
“So what was Mr. Polopetsi driving at?” asked Mma Ramotswe.
Mma Potokwane stared out of the window. Somewhere outside a child was crying, and her matron’s antennae had responded. But then the child stopped, and she moved her gaze to Mma Ramotswe.
“He told me that he had become a member of some sort of investment club,” she said. “He said that it was called the Fat Cattle Club and it offered very good returns. He said that the returns were, in fact, better than anything you could get from the banks or the insurance companies. He said that if I had a spare ten thousand pula he could arrange for me to join this club and get—and this was the part that astonished me—twenty-five per cent return on the money I put in.”
Mma Ramotswe’s astonishment showed. “Twenty-five per cent! That’s impossible, Mma.”
“Not with this scheme,” said Mma Potokwane. “At least, not according to Mr. Polopetsi. He said that he’s already drawn his twenty-five per cent profit—and he’s only been in the club for a few months. He said that an early pay-out was the reward you got for recruiting new members.”
Mma Ramotswe asked what the Fat Cattle Club did. She imagined that it was something to do with the buying and selling of cattle—a popular activity in Botswana and one that her own father, Obed Ramotswe, had excelled in.
“This Fat Cattle Club,” Mma Potokwane explained, “buys cattle from the drought areas in the north. Then it brings them down to a place near Lobatse and feeds them up until they are ready to sell. That’s how it makes its profits.”
“But twenty-five per cent?” said Mma Ramotswe. “You can’t make twenty-five per cent just by fattening cattle. You have the cost of the feed—cattle don’t get fat on air.”
“He said that’s all taken into account,” said Mma Potokwane. “The real return is twenty-five per cent. That’s what he said.”
Mma Ramotswe hardly dared ask the next question. But she had to know. “And did you join the club, Mma?”
The answer was the one she wanted. “Certainly not,” said Mma Potokwane. “To begin with, I don’t have a spare ten thousand pula. And then, even if I did, I don’t think I would invest it with Mr. Polopetsi. It’s not that I have anything against him, it’s just that he doesn’t strike me as being the business type. You know how some people have ‘business type’ written all over them, Mma? Well, I don’t think that Mr. Polopetsi is like that. He’s a chemist and occasional private detective. He’s not a business type.”
Mma Ramotswe agreed with that evaluation of Mr. Polopetsi, but she
knew that Mr. Polopetsi himself might see things differently. “Was he upset, Mma?”
Mma Potokwane shook her head. “Not in the slightest. But he did ask me whether I could recommend other people to him. So I thought and thought and eventually I came up with a cousin of my husband’s. This is a person who has quite a bit of money—he used to own a factory that made ladders—and likes to invest in good ideas.”
“I’m not sure that this is such a good idea.”
“Perhaps not. But there we are. I hope that it continues to do well—this Fat Cattle Club. It’s certainly doing a community service.”
Mma Ramotswe looked dubious. “By growing people’s money by twenty-five per cent?”
Mma Potokwane explained what she meant. “No, not by doing that. You see, he told me that they buy the cattle from the drought areas…”
“You said that.”
“Yes, but they give the poor farmers ten per cent more than they’d get from the Meat Commission. So they are doing them a favour in their hour of need. Isn’t that good, Mma?”
Mma Ramotswe knew what it was to have to sell your cattle because of drought. It was a last resort, a shameful thing, brought about by sheer desperation. There was something worse, of course, and that was when the cattle were in such poor condition through lack of grazing that they had no value and had to be slaughtered. That was the end of everything for some; to see the poor beasts so debilitated they could barely walk, standing there passively, awaiting their fate.
She very much approved of the idea of giving people more money for their cattle, but she was puzzled as to how this could be done. The price of cattle was ultimately determined by the market, and the market took all sorts of factors into consideration in deciding what to pay. Alongside supply—the more cattle, the lower the price—there was the cost of feed to be considered, and that was a major influence on price. Ideally, cattle would be left to fend for themselves, finding in grass and leaves all the sustenance they needed. Even in a dry land, such as Botswana, cattle could find enough in what seemed unpromising surroundings, but when drought struck and the last of the vegetation withered, they needed feeding to remain alive. That was expensive, as animal feed had to be brought in from over the border, and if the desiccated fingers of drought stretched out into the rich grasslands, the veld of Gauteng, then the price of foodstuff would soar.
If the Fat Cattle Club bought thin cattle for fattening, then that would only come at a cost. It was possible that they could move them to areas where there was still grazing to be had, but such areas were already under pressure because of the drought further north. And if the cattle were not to be given good grazing, then how was their condition to be improved—other than through the purchase of feed and salt licks? One did not have to be an economist to understand that this would eat into any profit on the eventual sale of the cattle, particularly if you had paid ten per cent above the going rate in the first place.
Mma Ramotswe raised these concerns with Mma Potokwane, who shrugged. “I don’t know much about these things, Mma,” said the matron. “All I know, though, from running this place, is that everything costs money, and there’s no easy way round that. You can’t grow money in the fields, no matter how hard you try.”
“Exactly, Mma. So how does Mr. Polopetsi imagine he’ll get twenty-five per cent?”
Again Mma Potokwane shrugged. “But he says he’s already had twenty-five per cent return on his original investment.” She paused. “Maybe the cattle were very good beasts, Mma. Maybe they were already quite fat.”
That was impossible, and Mma Ramotswe told her friend that. “Those poor cattle from up north are skin and bone these days. They would need to eat and eat to get into good condition.”
“Then it is a mystery,” concluded Mma Potokwane. She was losing interest in Mr. Polopetsi’s scheme, and wanted to talk about Mma Makutsi’s baby. “I hear that that baby of hers purrs like a cat, Mma. Is that true?”
“It is true,” said Mma Ramotswe. “It is very strange. I believe it is the only purring baby in Botswana.”
Mma Potokwane shook her head in wonderment. “There is more to Mma Makutsi than meets the eye,” she said. “Is it true that she talks to her shoes?”
Mma Ramotswe smiled. “Or they talk to her. Yes, I believe that something like that is going on, although I cannot believe that shoes would ever talk. That’s just nonsense, Mma.”
The practical side of Mma Potokwane was in firm agreement. “Of course it is. I suppose that it’s a question of her imagination. She imagines that her shoes are talking to her, but it’s really all in her mind. You see a lot of that with children, you know. They imagine things.”
“Oh yes, Mma. They do that all right.”
Mma Potokwane pointed in the direction of one of the cottages. “There’s a child in that cottage over there—a very imaginative child. She told the housemother that she has a friend who comes to visit her—a friend called Dolly. She seems convinced that this friend lives somewhere over in the Kalahari and rides a giraffe. Such nonsense. And yet she insists it’s all true. She even made a small cake for this friend the other day and left it out for her. Of course the ants got it first.”
“I have heard that children do that, especially if they’re lonely.”
Mma Potokwane looked thoughtful. “I suppose that if I didn’t have a real friend called Mma Ramotswe, I could invent one. I could say that this lady comes out here to see me in a tiny white van and we drink tea and eat fruit cake together. I could make up something like that—if I had to.”
Mma Ramotswe looked pointedly at the saucer beneath her teacup. That saucer was often used for a piece of Mma Potokwane’s fruit cake, but for some reason none had been offered that day.
“Oh, my goodness!” exclaimed Mma Potokwane. “What a thoughtless person I am—I have forgotten to offer you a piece of fruit cake, Mma. I thought after three helpings of goat stew you might not…”
“That was some time ago, Mma,” said Mma Ramotswe politely. “A piece of fruit cake would be most welcome, now that you mention it.”
Cake was produced, and their conversation continued for another ten minutes before Mma Ramotswe looked at her watch and said that she would have to leave. Although it was mid-afternoon, she wanted to call in at the agency and deal with one or two matters before going home. So she said goodbye to Mma Potokwane and began the drive back to town, thinking, as she did, of the story Mma Potokwane had told her of Mr. Polopetsi and the Fat Cattle Club. It was none of her business what Mr. Polopetsi did in his spare time, but she was fond of him and she felt a certain responsibility towards him. He was, after all, an employee—even if only a very part-time one, and a volunteer at that. More importantly, though, he was a friend, and Mma Ramotswe would never allow a friend to do anything stupid without at least issuing some sort of warning. Was that what she needed to do here? Was Mr. Polopetsi being stupid, or, on the contrary, astute? He was an intelligent man, with his degree in chemistry from the university, but intelligence and judgement were two different things—as her work had shown her on so many occasions and as Clovis Andersen, she seemed to remember, said at some point in The Principles of Private Detection. The great Clovis Andersen, from Muncie, Indiana—what would he say about the Fat Cattle Club if he were told about it? She thought for a moment, and then she heard his voice: Be very careful of anything that looks too good to be true. Because if it looks too good to be true, that’s probably because that’s exactly what it is!
CHAPTER FIVE
THE DOG REALLY LOVED THAT SMALL MAN
SHE COULD TELL from Mma Makutsi’s expression that something had happened. It was not her Something dreadful’s happened expression; it was more her You’ll never guess what’s happened look, and it involved a wry, rather coy smile.
“So you are back,” said Mma Makutsi. “And how was my friend Mma Potokwane?”
“She was very well, Mma. She sends you her good wishes. She was asking after you.”
Mma Makutsi’s
smile broadened. “I’m glad to hear that, Mma. I haven’t seen her for some time—I should go out and visit her, perhaps.” She paused. “Fruit cake?”
Mma Ramotswe nodded. “It was as delicious as usual.”
“How many pieces?” asked Mma Makutsi, adding hurriedly, “I would never blame you for having more than one, Mma. Her fruit cake really is special.”
Mma Ramotswe was able to be strictly honest; the question had been about fruit cake, not goat stew. “Just one piece, Mma.” She added, “Since you ask.”
Mma Makutsi shuffled a small pile of papers on her desk. “I must do some filing,” she said. “These papers are getting on top of me.”
Mma Ramotswe knew what was expected of her. “Did anything happen round here, Mma?”
She had read the situation correctly. Mma Makutsi did not wait long to reply, and her tone was triumphant. “Have you been round the back?” she asked.
“Round the back?”
“Yes, outside. The back of the garage. Go and take a look.”
The back of the garage was part of Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s domain and Mma Ramotswe rarely ventured round there. It was a place for the storage of oil drums, old tyres, empty wooden crates, and the sundry detritus of a small garage business. It was a place where Charlie and Fanwell liked to sit, perched on empty oil drums, and eat their lunchtime sandwiches. It was a male rather than a female place, one devoted to bits and pieces of old garage equipment, to things that were not currently useful but that may come in handy at some point; a place where men would feel at home.
She left the office by its front door and began to walk round the building. She had no idea what would await her, and her surprise was complete when she saw the dog tied to an old engine block. It was the dog that Fanwell had run over and that she had taken back to Old Naledi. It was back, and it greeted her with a frantic wagging of the tail and a combination of barks and howls. There was no sign of Fanwell, but as she stood there she saw him emerge from the back of the garage, hesitate when he saw her, but then come up to her. His expression was apologetic.