THE FOLLOWING DAY was a Saturday, which was Mma Ramotswe’s favourite day, a day on which she could sit and reflect on the week’s events. There was much to think about, and there was good reason, too, to be pleased that the week was over. Mma Ramotswe did not enjoy confrontation—that was not the Botswana way—and yet there were times when finding oneself head-to-head with somebody was inevitable. That had been so when her first husband, the selfish and violent Note Mokoti, had returned unannounced and tried to extort money from her. That moment had tested her badly, but she had stood up to him, and he had gone away, back into his private world of bitterness and distrust. But the encounter had left her feeling weak and raw, as arguments with another so often do. How much better to avoid occasions of conflict altogether, provided that one did not end up running away from things; and that, of course, was the rub. Had she not faced up to Aunty Emang, then the blackmail would have continued because nobody else would have stood up to her. And so it was left to Mma Ramotswe to do so, and Aunty Emang had folded up in the same way that an old hut made of elephant grass and eaten by the ants would collapse the moment one touched its fragile walls.

Now she sat on her verandah and looked out over her garden. She was the only one in the house. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had taken Puso and Motholeli to visit one of his aunts, and they would not be back until late afternoon, or, more likely, the evening. That particular aunt was known for her loquaciousness and had long stories to tell. It did not matter if the stories had been heard before—as they all had—they would be repeated that day, in great detail, until the sun was slanting down over the Kalahari and the evening sky was red. But it was important, she thought, that the children should get to know that aunt, as there was much she could teach them. In particular, she knew how to renew the pressed mud floor of a good traditional home, a skill that was dying out. The children sometimes helped her with this, although they would never themselves live in a house with a mud-floored yard, for those houses were going and were not being replaced. And all that was linked to them, the stories, the love and concern for others, the sense of doing what one’s people had done for so many years, could go too, thought Mma Ramotswe.