Boitelo shook her head. “I mean I don’t think that the doctor I’m talking about would go up to a patient and inject too much morphine. No, I don’t mean that. But I still think that what he is doing is wicked.” She paused. “But I was going to start at the beginning, Mma. Would you like me to do that?”

“Yes,” said Mma Ramotswe. “And I won’t interrupt you again. You just start. But first, Mma Makutsi will give you a cup of tea. It’s red bush tea, Mma. Do you mind?”

“This tea is very good for you,” said Boitelo, taking the cup which Mma Makutsi was handing her. “My aunt, who is late, used to drink it.”

Mma Ramotswe could not help smiling. It seemed strange to say that something was good for one and in the same breath say that one who used it is now late. There need be no connection, of course, but it seemed strange nonetheless. She imagined an advertisement: Red Bush Tea: much appreciated by people who are late. That would not be a good recommendation, she felt, whatever the intention behind it.

Boitelo took a sip of the bush tea and put her cup down on the table in front of her.

“After I qualified, Mma,” Boitelo went on, “I came to work in the Princess Marina. I became a theatre nurse there, and I think that I was good at the job. But then, after a while, I became tired of standing behind the doctors all the time and passing them things. I also didn’t like the bright lights, which I think gave me headaches. And I don’t think that they are good for your eyes, those lights. When I came out of the theatre and closed my eyes I could still see bright circles, as if the lights were still there. So I decided to do something different, and I saw an advertisement for a nurse to work in a general practitioner’s clinic. I was interested in this. The surgery was not too far from where I lived, and I would even be able to walk there in the cooler weather. So I went for an interview.

“My interview was on a Monday afternoon, after the doctor had finished seeing his patients. I was due to work that day, but I was able to change my duties around so that I was free to go. I went along and there was Dr …” She had been on the point of giving the name, but she checked herself.

“You don’t have to tell me,” said Mma Ramotswe, remembering that Boitelo had confessed to feeling frightened.