The Double Comfort Safari Club - By Alexander McCall Smith Page 0,32
hear that there are such wicked women in Botswana.”
Mma Ramotswe cleared her throat. “I am not sure what I can do for you, Rra. I shall have to think about what you have told me and see if I can come up with a suggestion. But it sounds as if the lawyer was right—you have given something away, and it is usually impossible to get a gift back once it has been made.”
Mr. Kereleng sighed. “That is what everybody says, Mma. I thought that maybe you …”
“I shall see if I can think of something,” said Mma Ramotswe. “It’s just that sometimes I have to warn people right at the beginning that their case sounds very difficult, and that it may not be possible to help them. That is all.”
“I understand,” said Mr. Kereleng, his voice filled with defeat. “Thank you, Mma.”
Mma Ramotswe moved the papers on her desk. She picked up a pencil. “I need a bit of information,” she said, sounding more businesslike. “You should give me the name of this lady and the address of the house.”
Mr. Kereleng looked up. He was weary, with the look of one who knows that his case is no case. “She is called Violet,” he said. “Violet Sephotho.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE LADY OF THE AFTERNOON
MMA RAMOTSWE was as capable as anyone else of containing herself, but there were some situations—and this was one of them—where nobody could be expected to resist the urge to speak about something. After the departure of the unfortunate Mr. Kereleng, she and Mr. Polopetsi sat for almost half an hour discussing this latest story of Violet Sephotho’s perfidious behaviour. Both were quite shocked; they knew of Violet’s treacherous fiancé-stealing plans; they knew of her utter ruthlessness when it came to any men, fiancés or others; but now she was revealed as a downright thief and trickster, and that was something new.
It was all very well talking to Mr. Polopetsi about it. He knew all about Violet and disapproved of her strongly, but talking to a man about something like this, although satisfying, was not quite as good as a discussion with another woman, and with Mma Makutsi in particular. She had been Violet’s victim on more than one occasion, and would naturally be most interested to hear all about this new instance of her rival’s wickedness.
Mma Ramotswe had not intended to bother her assistant during her compassionate leave, but by four o’clock that afternoon she could no longer bear to leave the news unconveyed.
“I am going to check up on Mma Makutsi,” she announced to Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni in the garage workshop. “I am closing the agency for the day.”
Charlie, who was leaning against the side of a car wiping a car part with an oily rag, looked up.
“Are you going to check up that she is not having a party?” he asked. “You know her, Mma. Compassionate leave? Passionate leave!”
“Do not say such things,” snapped Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni.
“That was not very kind, Charlie,” said Mma Ramotswe.
Charlie looked wounded. “I was only joking, Mma! Just a joke!”
“Can you see Mma Ramotswe or me laughing?” asked Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “Are we laughing at your joke?” He turned to Mma Ramotswe. “Tell her that I hope that Phuti is doing well and will be back on his feet soon.”
“He has only got one foot now,” muttered Charlie.
“What was that, Charlie?” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “Did you say something?”
“Charlie is only trying to be helpful,” said Mma Ramotswe, giving the apprentice a sideways look. “And remember this, Charlie: there but for the grace of God go you. Remember that.”
She got into her van—the new blue van that drove so smoothly—and made her way over to Mma Makutsi’s house. It was possible that she was at the hospital, she thought, but if she had been there in the morning—as she said she would be—then she might be home by now. And turning into Mma Makutsi’s street, a street of modest houses occupied, she imagined, by people for whom reaching even this level of prosperity and comfort had been a battle, she pictured Mma Makutsi’s reaction to this piece of news about Violet. It was an odd thing, thought Mma Ramotswe, that we take such pleasure in hearing news of some piece of bad behaviour on the part of one of whom we have come to disapprove. Such news should sadden us, as any news of human failings should do, but it tended to do the opposite. Why? Because it confirmed the view