Mma Makutsi was not sure about this. One might not be able to wear more than one pair of shoes at a time, but that did not mean that one could not wear a different pair each day, or even one pair in the morning and another in the afternoon. Did rich people do that sort of thing, she wondered. She only had two pairs of shoes at the moment, although she was planning to acquire another pair before too long. She had her ordinary working shoes, which were brown and had been resoled and repaired rather more times than she would care to remember; and then there was her special pair of shoes, green on the outside and with sky-blue linings—the pair of shoes which she had bought with the first profits of the Kalahari Typing School for Men and of which she was so inordinately proud. She wore these shoes to work from time to time, but it seemed a pity to waste them on such mundane use and so she usually reserved them now for occasions such as the dancing class. What she needed now was to buy a smarter pair of shoes for use in the office, and she had in fact identified just such a pair in one of the stores. The shoes were red, and although they had no special coloured lining, they had two large gold ornamental buckles which gave them an air of authority which her other shoes did not have. These were bold shoes, and she would wear them when confronting difficult men, as she occasionally had to do. Men would be mesmerised by the buckles, and this would give her just the advantage that one needed when dealing with men like that.

Although she was reluctant to raise the issue, Mma Makutsi had long been wanting to say something to Mma Ramotswe about the sort of shoes which the older woman wore. Mma Ramotswe was not a flashy dresser, preferring good, reliable skirts and loose blouses, but she nonetheless had a good eye for colour and always looked smart. But when it came to shoes, then it seemed that her dress sense let her down, as she was usually to be seen in a pair of rather shapeless brown shoes with bulges on both sides reflecting the shape of her toes. These shoes were in no sense elegant, and it seemed to Mma Makutsi that they should be replaced by something rather more in keeping with Mma Ramotswe’s position as Botswana’s senior lady private detective.

Mma Ramotswe’s shoes had been touched upon in conversation once before, and the outcome had not been satisfactory. Mma Makutsi had mentioned that there was a shoe sale at one of the shops at the Game Centre, and that in her view there were bargains to be had.