The Double Comfort Safari Club - By Alexander McCall Smith Page 0,9

change everything just to make it more efficient.”

“I know you aren’t,” said Mma Ramotswe. “But you are still right.”

Mma Makutsi, in her misery, looked down at her shoes, as she often did at such moments. She was wearing her everyday footwear—a pair of brown shoes with rather frayed edges, shoes that had the look of experience. They looked back at her with that slight air of superiority that her shoes tended to effect. Don’t look at us, Boss, the shoes said. It was your big idea, not ours. We don’t go around trying to change things, do we? We do not.

AS IT HAPPENED, there were few takers for tea that morning, as the mechanics were busier than usual and unable to take the time off. An hour or so later, though, Charlie came in to report that he was going out to fetch a spare part for Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, and would be happy to see if there was any mail in the mailbox near the Riverside filling station. His offer was accepted, and he returned twenty minutes later with a bundle of letters, which he placed on Mma Ramotswe’s desk.

“There is only one interesting letter there,” he said. “It is from a place in the United States. I can tell from the stamp. Wow! One, two, three!”

Mma Makutsi looked at him with irritation. “It is none of your business,” she said. “Our letters are none of your business, Charlie. You are just a mechanic—not a detective.” Her irritation suddenly changed to pleasure as she contemplated her next observation. “Actually, you are just an apprentice, not a proper mechanic yet.”

It was a telling blow. Charlie and Fanwell had not made great progress with their apprenticeships, largely because of their failure to apply themselves to the regular examinations that the Apprenticeship Board required. Fanwell, at least, had an excuse for this, as he was chronically dyslexic and, although intelligent, had difficulty understanding examination questions. Charlie, who was both intelligent and a quick reader, could claim only fecklessness as an excuse, if it were an excuse, which of course it was not.

“It is addressed to Mma Ramotswe,” he snapped. “Not to you.”

Mma Ramotswe made a calming gesture; she did not like the arguments that seemed to flare up between these two, nor any arguments, for that matter. “I do not mind,” she muttered as she extracted the white airmail letter from the pile of manila envelopes.

Charlie threw a triumphant glance towards Mma Makutsi. “You must be very proud, Mma,” he said. “You must be proud that there are people there who know about you and are writing to you. Nobody in America knows about her over there. She is an unknown lady, Mma; you are very well known.”

“Ssh, Charlie,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I am sure that there are many people there who know about Mma Makutsi. Or they will in future, I am certain of it.”

She slit open the letter and began to read it. They watched her, and at the end she said, “Oh dear, I am very sorry. This is very sad, but also it is very good news for one man.”

CHAPTER THREE

MARRIED, LIKE DOVES

SO, MMA RAMOTSWE,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “So you received a big letter today.”

They were sitting on the veranda at Zebra Drive at that companionable hour when the late afternoon shades almost imperceptibly into early evening. The sky was not yet dark, but had become paler, and pinker, too, in the west. Dusk was not far off, but had not yet made its softening mark; yet the birds knew, and were flying from tree to tree restlessly, finding just the right place to spend the impending night. A pair of Cape turtle doves, as married as the couple sitting on the veranda, edged closer to one another on the bough of the acacia tree that sheltered part of Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s vegetable garden. Their anxious cooing could be heard alongside the sound of a car making its way home to a neighbouring house, the half-hearted barking of a neighbour’s dog, the sound of a radio somewhere indeterminate.

Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, unusually for him, was drinking a beer. He drank very little, and Mma Ramotswe hardly at all, but on the occasional evening he would unwind with a glass of Lion lager, savouring the feel of the damp, cold glass against his hand almost as much as the freshening sharpness of the beer. Mma Ramotswe would sometimes accompany him, as she did now, taking a teaspoon of beer—a