Poppy stopped. Towards the end of her tale, her voice had risen, and by the time that she finished, the words were coming in gasps. Mma Ramotswe leaned forward and took her hand. “Do not be upset, Mma,” she said gently. “She is just making threats. Often these people don’t do what they threaten to do, isn’t that right, Mma Makutsi?”

Mma Makutsi glanced at Mma Ramotswe before she answered. She thought that people like that often did exactly what they threatened to do—and worse—but now was not the time to express such doubts. “Hot air,” she said. “You would think that in Botswana we had enough hot air, with the Kalahari just over there, but there are still people like this Mma Tsau who add to the hot air. And you do not need to worry about hot air, Mma.”

Poppy looked over towards Mma Makutsi and smiled weakly. “I hope that you’re right, Mma,” she said. “But I am not sure. And anyway, what was this letter? I did not write to her about it.”

Mma Ramotswe rose from her seat and walked to the window. Poppy had spoken about how chefs liked to look at the sky when they had the chance; well, so did private detectives, she thought; ladies and private detectives. Indeed, everybody should look at the sky when they could, because the sky had many answers, provided one knew how to see them. And now, as she looked at the sky, over the tops of the acacia trees and up into that echoing emptiness, it seemed to her so very obvious that Poppy was not the only person who knew about the food and that the other person who knew—who, again so obviously, must have been the cleaning woman—was taking the opportunity to blackmail Mma Tsau. Unfortunately for Poppy, she was getting the blame, but that was quite typical of life, was it not? The wrong people often got the blame, the wrong people suffered for what the right people did. And the sky in all this, the sky which had seen so much of it, was neutral, absolutely neutral.

The problem with blackmail, thought Mma Ramotswe, is this: the victim is often a wrongdoer, but, once blackmailed, attracts our sympathy. But why should we feel sorry for somebody who is simply being made to pay for the wrong that he did? It occurred to Mma Ramotswe that this was a problem that deserved serious consideration. Perhaps it was even a question to put to Aunty Emang. Aunty Emang …

CHAPTER FOUR

WHAT FEMINISTS HAVE IN MIND FOR MEN

MMA MAKUTSI made the evening meal that night for Mr Phuti Radiphuti, her newly acquired fiancé. Phuti Radiphuti was the son of the elder Mr Radiphuti, successful businessman, farmer, and proprietor of the Double Comfort Furniture Shop. She had met Phuti at the dancing classes which they had both attended at the Academy of Dance and Movement. This was not a real academy, in that it had no buildings and indeed had no staff other than the woman who took the money and the instructor, Mr Fano Fanope, an accomplished dancer who had danced, successfully, in Johannesburg and Nairobi. Word of the engagement had spread round the dance class, and Mr Fanope himself had made an official announcement at the end of one evening that the academy was proud to have brought the couple together.