Blue Shoes and Happiness

by Alexander McCall Smith

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  WAITING FOR A VISIT

  THE NEXT MORNING when Mma Ramotswe arrived at the shared premises of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors and the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, she found Mr Polopetsi with his head under a car. She was always wary of calling out to a mechanic when he was under a car, as they inevitably bumped their heads in surprise. And so she bent down and whispered to him, “Dumela, Rra. Have you anything to tell me?”

  Mr Polopetsi heaved himself out from under the car and wiped his hands on a piece of cloth. “Yes, I do,” he said keenly. “I have some very interesting news for you.”

  “You found Poppy?”

  “Yes, I found her.”

  “And you had a word with her?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  Mma Ramotswe looked at him expectantly. “Well?”

  “I asked her whether she had written a letter to anybody about what had happened. That is exactly what I asked her.”

  Mma Ramotswe felt herself becoming impatient. “Come on, Mr Polopetsi. Tell me what she said.”

  Mr Polopetsi raised a finger in one of his characteristic gestures of emphasis. “You’ll never believe who she wrote to, Mma Ramotswe. You’ll never guess.”

  Mma Ramotswe savoured her moment. “Aunty Emang?” she said quietly.

  Mr Polopetsi looked deflated. “Yes. How did you know that?”

  “I had a hunch, Mr Polopetsi. I had a hunch.” She affected a careless tone. “I find that sometimes I have a hunch, and sometimes they are correct. Anyway, that’s very useful information you came up with there. It confirms my view of what is happening.”

  “I do not know what is happening,” said Mr Polopetsi.

  “Then I will tell you, Rra,” said Mma Ramotswe, pointing to her office. “Come inside and sit down, and I will tell you exactly what is going on and what we need to do.”

  BOTH MMA MAKUTSI and Mr Polopetsi listened attentively as Mma Ramotswe gave an account of where she had got to in the blackmail investigation.

  “Now what do we do?” asked Mma Makutsi. “We know who it is. Do we go to the police?”

  “No,” said Mma Ramotswe. “At least, not yet.”

  “Well?” pressed Mr Polopetsi. “Do we go and talk to Aunty Emang, whoever she is?”

  “No,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I have a better idea than that. We get Aunty Emang to come and talk to us. Here in our office. We get her to sit in that chair and tell us all about her nasty ways.”

  Mr Polopetsi laughed. “She will never come, Mma! Why should she come?”

  “Oh, she will come all right,” said Mma Ramotswe. “Mma Makutsi, I should like to dictate a letter. Mr Polopetsi, you stay and listen to what I have to say.”

  Mma Makutsi liked to use her shorthand, which had been described by the examiners at the Botswana Secretarial College as “quite the best shorthand we have ever seen, in the whole history of the college.”

  “Are you ready, Mma?” asked Mma Ramotswe, composing herself at her desk. She was aware of being watched closely by Mr Polopetsi, who appeared to be hanging on her every word. This was a very important moment.

  “The letter goes to,” she said, “… to Aunty Emang, at the newspaper. Begin. Dear Aunty Emang, I am a lady who needs your help and I am writing to you because I know that you give very good advice. I am a private detective, and my name is Mma Ramotswe of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency (but please do not print that bit in the paper, dear Aunty, as I would not like people to know that I am the person who has written this letter).”

  She paused, as Mma Makutsi’s pencil darted across the page of her notebook.

  “Ready,” said Mma Makutsi.

  “A few weeks ago,” dictated Mma Ramotswe, “I met a lady who told me that she was being blackmailed about stealing food and giving it to her husband. I wondered if this lady was telling the truth, but I found out that she was when she showed me the letter and I saw that it was true. Then I found out something really shocking. I spoke to somebody who told me that the blackmailer was a lady who worked at your newspaper! Now I do not know what to do with this information. One part of me tells me that I should just forget about it and mind my own business. The other tells me that I should pass on this name they gave me to the police. I really do not know what to do, and I thought that you would be the best person to advise me. So please, Aunty Emang, will you come and see me at my office and tell me in person what I should do? You are the only one I have spoken to about this, and you are the one I trust. You can come any day before five o’clock, which is when we go home. Our office is part of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, which you cannot miss if you drive along the Tlokweng Road in the direction of Tlokweng. I am waiting for you. Your sincere friend, Precious Ramotswe.”

  Mma Ramotswe finished with a flourish. “There,” she said. “What do you think of that?”

  “It is brilliant, Mma,” said Mr Polopetsi. “Shall I deliver it right now? To the newspaper office?”

  “Yes, please,” said Mma Ramotswe. “And write ‘urgent’ on the envelope. I think that we shall have a visit from Aunty Emang before we go home from work today.”

  “I think so too,” said Mma Makutsi. “Now I will type it and you can sign it. This is a very clever letter, Mma. Perhaps the cleverest letter you have ever written.”

  “Thank you, Mma,” said Mma Ramotswe.

  HOW SLOWLY the hours can pass, thought Mma Ramotswe. After the writing of the letter to Aunty Emang, the letter that she was confident would draw the blackmailer from her lair, she found it difficult to settle down to anything. Not that she had a great deal of work to do; there were one or two routine matters that required to be worked upon, but both of these involved going out and speaking to people and she did not wish to leave the office that day in case Aunty Emang should arrive. So she sat at her desk, idly paging through a magazine. Mma Ramotswe loved magazines, and could not resist the stand of tempting titles that were on constant display at the Pick-and-Pay supermarket. She liked magazines that combined practical advice (hints for the kitchen and the garden) with articles on the doings of famous people. She knew that these articles should not be taken seriously, but they were fun nonetheless, a sort of gossip, not at all dissimilar to the gossip exchanged in the small stores of Mochudi or with friends on the verandah of the President Hotel, or even with Mma Makutsi when they both had nothing to do. Such gossip was fascinating because it dealt with day-to-day life; the second marriage of the man who ran the new insurance agency in the shopping centre; the unsuitable boyfriend of a well-known politician’s daughter; the unexpected promotion of a senior army officer and the airs and graces of his wife, and so on.

  She turned the pages of the magazine. There was Prince Charles inspecting his organic biscuit factory. That was very interesting, thought Mma Ramotswe. She had her strong likes and dislikes. She liked Bishop Tutu and that man with the untidy hair who sang to help the hungry. She liked Prince Charles, and here was a picture of a box of his special biscuits, which he sold for his charity. Mma Ramotswe looked at them and wondered what they would taste like. She thought that they would go rather well with bush tea, and she imagined having a packet of them on her desk so that she and Mma Makutsi could help themselves at will. But then she remembered her diet, and her stomach gave a lurch of disappointment and longing.

  She continued to page through the magazine. There was a picture of the Pope getting into a helicopter, holding on to the round white cap that he was wearing so that it should not blow away. There were a couple of cardinals in red standing behind him, and she noted that they were both very traditionally built, which was reassuring for her. If I ever see God, she thought, I am sure that he will not be thin.

  At midday, Charlie, the older apprentice, came in and asked Mma Makutsi for a loan. “Now that you have a rich husband,” he said, “you can afford to lend me some money.”

  Mma Makutsi gave him a disapproving look. “Mr Phuti Radiphuti is not yet my husband,” she said. “And he is not a ve
ry rich man. He has enough money, that is all.”

  “Well, he must give you some, Mma,” Charlie persisted. “And if he does, then surely you can lend me eight hundred pula.”

  Mma Makutsi looked to Mma Ramotswe for support. “Eight hundred pula,” she said. “What do you want with eight hundred pula? That is a lot of money, isn’t it, Mma Ramotswe?”

  “It is,” said Mma Ramotswe. “What do you need it for?”

  Charlie looked embarrassed. “It is for a present for my girlfriend,” he said. “I want to buy her something.”

  “Your girlfriend!” shrieked Mma Makutsi. “That’s interesting news. I thought you boys didn’t stay around long enough to call anybody your girlfriend. And now here you are talking about buying her a present. This is very important news!”

  Charlie glanced resentfully at Mma Makutsi and then looked away.

  “And what are you thinking of buying her?” asked Mma Makutsi. “A diamond ring?”

  Charlie looked down at the ground. He had his hands clasped behind his back, like a man appearing on a charge, and Mma Ramotswe felt a sudden surge of sympathy for him. Mma Makutsi could be a bit hard on the apprentices on occasion; even if they were feckless boys for much of the time, they still had their feelings and she did not like to see them humiliated.

  “Tell me about this girl, Charlie,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I am sure that she is a very pretty girl. What does she do?”

  “She works in a dress shop,” said Charlie. “She has a very good job.”

  “And have you known her long?” asked Mma Ramotswe.

  “Three weeks,” said Charlie.

  “Well,” said Mma Makutsi. “What about this present? Is it a ring?”

  Her question had not been intended seriously, and she was not prepared for the answer. “Yes,” said Charlie. “It is for a ring.”

  Silence descended on the room. Outside, in the heat of the day, cicadas screeched their endless mating call. The world seemed still at such a time of day, in the heat, and movement seemed pointless, an unwanted disturbance. This was a time for sitting still, doing nothing, until the shadows lengthened and the afternoon became cooler.

  Mma Makutsi spoke softly. “Isn’t three weeks a bit early to get somebody a ring? Three weeks …”

  Charlie looked up and fixed her with an intense gaze. “You don’t know anything about it, Mma. You don’t know what it is like to be in love. I am in love now, and I know what I’m talking about.”

  Mma Makutsi reeled in the face of the outburst. “I’m sorry … ,” she began.

  “You don’t think I have feelings,” said Charlie. “All the time you have just laughed at me. You think I don’t know that? You think I can’t tell?”

  Mma Makutsi held up a hand in a placatory gesture. “Listen, Charlie, you cannot say …”

  “Yes, I can,” said Charlie. “Boys have feelings too. I don’t want eight hundred pula from you. I do not even want two pula. If you offered to give it to me, I would not take it. Warthog.”

  Mma Ramotswe rose to her feet. “Charlie! You are not to call Mma Makutsi a warthog. You have done that before. I will not allow it. I shall have to speak to Mr J.L.B. Matekoni.”

  He moved towards the door. “I am right. She is a warthog. I do not understand why that Radiphuti wants to marry a warthog. Maybe he is a warthog too.”

  BY THREE O’CLOCK in the afternoon, Mma Ramotswe had taken to looking at her watch anxiously. She wondered now whether the premise upon which she had based her letter to Aunty Emang was entirely wrong. She had no proof that Aunty Emang was the blackmailer—it was no more than surmise. The facts fitted, of course, but facts could fit many situations and still not be the full explanation. If Aunty Emang was not the blackmailer, then she would treat her letter simply as any other one which she received from her readers, and would be unlikely to put herself out by coming to the office. She looked at her watch again. The excitement of Charlie’s outburst earlier on had dissipated, and now there was nothing more to look forward to but a couple of hours of fruitless waiting.

  Shortly before five, when Mma Ramotswe had reluctantly decided that she had been mistaken, Mma Makutsi, who had a better view from her desk of what was happening outside, hissed across to her, “A car, Mma Ramotswe, a car!”

  Mma Ramotswe immediately tidied the magazines off her desk and carefully placed her half-finished cup of bush tea into her top drawer. “You go outside and meet her,” she said to Mma Makutsi. “But first tell Mr Polopetsi to come in.”

  Mma Makutsi did as she was asked and walked out to where the car was parked under the acacia tree. It was an expensive car, she noticed, not a Mercedes-Benz, but close enough. As she approached, a remarkably small woman, tiny indeed, stepped out of the vehicle and approached her. Mma Ramotswe, craning her neck, saw this from within the office, and watched intently as Mma Makutsi bent to talk to the woman.

  “She’s very small,” Mma Ramotswe whispered to Mr Polopetsi. “Look at her!”

  Mr Polopetsi’s jaw had opened with surprise. “Look at her,” he echoed. “Look at her.”

  Aunty Emang was ushered into the office by Mma Makutsi. Mma Ramotswe stood up to greet her, and did so politely, with the traditional Setswana courtesies. After all, she was her guest, even if she was a blackmailer.

  Aunty Emang glanced about the office casually, almost scornfully.

  “So this is the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency,” she said. “I have heard of this place. I did not think it would be so small.”

  Mma Ramotswe said nothing, but indicated the client’s chair. “Please sit down,” she said. “I think you are Aunty Emang. Is that correct?”

  “Yes,” said the woman. “I am Aunty Emang. That is me. And you are this lady, Precious Ramotswe?” Her voice was high-pitched and nasal, like the voice of a child. It was not a voice that was comforting to listen to, and the fact that it emanated from such a tiny person made it all the more disconcerting.

  “I am, Mma,” said Mma Ramotswe. “And this is Mma Makutsi and Mr Polopetsi. They both work here.”

  Aunty Emang looked briefly in the direction of Mma Makutsi and Mr Polopetsi, who was standing beside her. She nodded abruptly. Mma Ramotswe watched her, fascinated by the fact that she was so small. She was like a doll, she thought; a small, malignant doll.

  “Now this letter you wrote to me,” said Aunty Emang. “I came to see you because I do not like the thought of anybody being worried. It is my job to help people in their difficulties.”

  Mma Ramotswe looked at her. Her visitor’s small face, with its darting, slightly hooded eyes, was impassive, but there was something in the eyes which disturbed her. Evil, she thought. That is what I see. Evil. She had seen it only once or twice in her life, and on each occasion she had known it. Most human failings were no more than that—failings—but evil went beyond that.

  “This person who says that she knows somebody who is a blackmailer is just talking nonsense,” went on Aunty Emang. “I do not think that you should take the allegation seriously. People are always inventing stories, you know. I see it every day.”

  “Are they?” said Mma Ramotswe. “Well, I hear lots of stories in my work too, and some of them are true.”

  Aunty Emang sat quite still. She had not expected quite so confident a response. This woman, this fat woman, would have to be handled differently.

  “Of course,” Aunty Emang said. “Of course you’re right. Some stories are true. But why would you think this one is?”

  “Because I trust the person who told me,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I think that this person is telling the truth. She is not a person to make anything up.”

  “If you thought that,” said Aunty Emang, “then why did you write to me for my advice?”

  Mma Ramotswe reached for a pencil in front of her and twisted it gently through her fingers. Mma Makutsi saw this and recognised the mannerism. It was what Mma Ramotswe always did before she was about to make a revelation. She nudged Mr Polopetsi discreetly.


  “I wrote to you,” said Mma Ramotswe, “because you are the blackmailer. That is why.”

  Mr Polopetsi, watching intently, swayed slightly and thought for a moment that he was going to faint. This was the sort of moment that he had imagined would arise in detective work: the moment of denouement when the guilty person faced exposure, when the elaborate reasoning of detection was revealed. Oh, Mma Ramotswe, he thought, what a splendid woman you are!

  Aunty Emang did not move, but sat staring impassively at her accuser. When she spoke, her voice sounded higher than before, and there was a strange clicking when she started talking, like the clicking of a valve. “You are speaking lies, fat woman,” she said.

  “Oh, am I?” retorted Mma Ramotswe. “Well, here are some details. Mma Tsau. She was the one who was stealing food. You blackmailed her because she would lose her job if she was found out. Then there is Dr Lubega. You found out about him, about what happened in Uganda. And a man who was having an affair and was worried that his wife would find out.” She paused. “I have the details of many cases here in this file.”

  Aunty Emang snorted. “Dr Lubega? Who is this Dr Lubega? I do not know anybody of that name.”

  Mma Ramotswe glanced at Mma Makutsi and smiled. “You have just shown me that I was right,” she said. “You have confirmed it.”

  Aunty Emang rose from her chair. “You cannot prove anything, Mma. The police will laugh at you.”

  Mma Ramotswe sat back in her chair. She put the pencil down. And she thought, How might I think if I were in this woman’s shoes? How do you think if you are so heartless as to blackmail those who are frightened and guilty? And the answer that came back to her was this: hate. Somewhere some wrong had been done, a wrong connected with who she was perhaps, a wrong which turned her to despair and to hate. And hate had made it possible for her to do all this.

  “No, I cannot prove it. Not yet. But I want to tell you one thing, Mma, and I want you to think very carefully about what I tell you. No more Aunty Emang for you. You will have to earn your living some other way. If Aunty Emang continues, then I will make it my business—all of us here in this room, Mma Makutsi over there, who is a very hard-working detective, and Mr Polopetsi there, who is a very intelligent man—we shall all make it our business to find the proof that we don’t have at the moment. Do you understand me?”