“Normally there’s no difficulty in getting some men to come with me. They take it in turns, and pitch up of their own accord. Well, last Saturday it seemed to be a very different situation. Nobody was willing to volunteer, and when I went down to the houses to see what was going on, everybody’s door was firmly shut.”

Mma Ramotswe raised an eyebrow. “They were scared?”

“That’s the only explanation,” said Neil.

“Scared of poachers?”

Neil shrugged his shoulders. “It’s difficult to say. I would have thought that was unlikely. The sort of poachers we get round here will usually run a mile rather than come up against any of us. They’re not a very impressive breed of poacher, I’m afraid.”

“So?” pressed Mma Ramotswe. “Was there anything else?”

Neil thought for a moment. “There have been other odd things. One of the women who works in the kitchen ran out screaming her head off the other day. She was hysterical. She said that she had seen something in the storeroom.”

“And?” encouraged Mma Ramotswe.

“I called one of the other women to calm her down,” said Neil. “Then I went and had a look in the storeroom. Of course, there was nothing. But when I tried to get the women to come in with me so that I could show them that there was nothing there, they both refused. Both of them. The woman who was trying to calm her friend down was just as bad.”

Mma Ramotswe listened carefully. This was beginning to sound familiar to her. Although it happened relatively infrequently, it still happened. Witchcraft. Somebody was practising witchcraft, and the moment that happened, then all reason, all sound ideas and rationality, could be abandoned. Just below the surface, there were deep wells of fear and superstition that could suddenly be revealed by something like this. It was less common than it used to be, but it was there.

She looked at her watch. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni needed that axle, and she and Mma Makutsi did not have the time to sit and talk much longer, pleasant though it was to sit under that tree.

“I will come back sometime soon,” said Mma Ramotswe. “And when I come back, I shall look into these things for you. In the meantime, we must get that axle for Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. That is what we need to do first. The other thing can wait.”

Mma Ramotswe went back to her van and drove it down to the workshop area, while Neil and Mma Makutsi walked together down the track to meet her there. It took no more than a few minutes for the half-axle to be found among a pile of greasy spare parts. Then it was loaded into the back of the tiny white van, where it rested on some spread-out newspapers. Mma Ramotswe noticed that the two men who picked up the axle and manoeuvred it into the van said nothing beyond a mumbled greeting, completing their task in silence and then turning away, melting back into the workshop.