She had a report to write, and she busied herself with this. It was not an easy one, as she had to detail the weaknesses she had found in the hiring department of a company which provided security guards. They imagined that they screened out applicants with a criminal record when they sought jobs with the company; Mma Ramotswe had discovered that it was simplicity itself to lie about one’s past on the application form and that the forms were usually not even scrutinised by the official in charge of the personnel department. This man, who had got the job through lying about his qualifications and experience, rubber-stamped the applications of virtually anybody, but particularly of applications submitted by any of his relatives. Mma Ramotswe’s report would not make comfortable reading for the company, and she knew to expect some anger over the results. This was inevitable—people did not like to be told uncomfortable truths, even if they had asked for them. Uncomfortable truths meant that one had to go back and invent a whole new set of procedures, and that was not always welcome when there were so many other things to do.

As she listed the defects in the firm’s arrangements, Mma Ramotswe thought of how difficult it was to have a completely secure system for anything. The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was a case in point. They kept all their records in two old filing cabinets, and neither of these, she realised, had a lock, or at least a lock that worked. There was a lock on the office door, naturally enough, but during the day they rarely bothered to use that if both of them went out on some errand. There were always people around the garage, of course—either Mr J.L.B. Matekoni or the apprentices, and surely intruders would be deterred by their presence … No, she thought, perhaps not. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni was often so absorbed in tinkering with an engine that he would not notice it if the President himself drew up in his large official car. And as for the apprentices, they were completely unobservant and missed the most glaring features of what went on round about them. Indeed, she had given up on asking them for descriptions of clients who might have called while she was out and spoken to one of them. “There was a man,” they would say. “He came to see you. Now he is gone.” And in response to questioning for some clue as to the caller’s identity, they would say, “He was not a very tall man, I think. Or maybe he was a bit tall. I could not tell.”