When she had finished reading out the letter, Mma Makutsi looked up. Her earlier expression of defeat, brought on by Phuti Radiphuti’s non-appearance and by her contemplation of her future, had been replaced by one of anger. “That’s blackmail,” she said. “That’s … that’s …” Her outrage had got the better of her; there were no words strong enough to describe what she felt.

“That’s simple wickedness,” supplied Mma Ramotswe. “Even if Mma Tsau is a thief, the writer of that letter is much worse.”

Mma Makutsi was in strong agreement with this. “Yes. Wickedness. But how are we going to find out who wrote it? It’s anonymous.”

“Such letters always are,” said Mma Ramotswe.

“Have you got any ideas?”

Mma Ramotswe had to confess that she had none. “But that doesn’t mean that we shall not find out,” she said. “I have a feeling that we are very close to that person. I don’t know why I feel that, but I am sure that we know that lady.”

“A lady?” asked Mma Makutsi. “How do we know it’s a lady?”

“I just feel it,” said Mma Ramotswe. “That’s a woman’s voice.”

“Are you sure that that’s not just because I was reading it?” said Mma Makutsi.

Mma Ramotswe replied with care. No, it was not just that. The voice—the voice inside the letter—was the voice of a woman. And, as she explained to Mma Makutsi, she had the feeling, vague and elusive though it might be, that she knew this woman.

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER TEN

YOU ARE FRIGHTENED OF SOMETHING

THAT AFTERNOON Mma Ramotswe made one of her lists. She liked to do this when life seemed to be becoming complicated, which it was now, as the mere fact of listing helped to get everything into perspective. And there was more to it than that; often the listing of a problem produced a solution, as if the act of writing down the issues gave the unconscious mind a nudge. She had heard that sleep could have the same effect. “Go to sleep on a problem,” Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had once advised her, “and in the morning you will have your answer. It always works.” He had then proceeded to describe how he had gone to sleep wondering why a rather complicated diesel engine would not fire and had dreamed that night of loose connections in the solenoid. “And when I got to the garage that morning,” he said, “there it was—a very bad connection, which I replaced. The engine fired straightaway.”