In Mma Ramotswe’s case, her attachment to the tiny white van was more emotional than financial in origin. She had bought the tiny white van when she first came to live in Gaborone, and it had served her loyally since that day. It was not a fast vehicle, nor a particularly comfortable one; the suspension had been in a bad way for some time, especially on the driver’s side, in view of Mma Ramotswe’s traditional build, which posed some degree of strain on the system. And the engine had a tendency to go out of tune very shortly after Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had attended to it, which meant that the tiny white van would splutter and jerk from time to time. In Mma Ramotswe’s view, though, these were small matters: as long as the tiny white van was capable of getting her around, and as long as it did not break down too often, she proposed holding on to it. She thought of it as a friend, a staunch ally in this world, an ally to whom she owed a strong debt of loyalty.

These professional reputations meant that both Mma Ramo-tswe and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni were rather busier than they would have liked to be. So it was with some pleasure that Mma Ramotswe managed that evening to secure the hour between five and six as time when the two of them could sit on the verandah, and walk about their garden, and drink a cup of bush tea. She wanted to do this, not only to give Mr J.L.B. Matekoni a chance to unwind (he was, she thought, working far too hard), but also because she wanted to spend some time talking to him, alone, without Mma Makutsi or the apprentices, or even Motholeli and Puso listening in.

They sat together on the verandah, mugs of tea in hand. The sky was of that colour which it assumed at the end of the day—a late afternoon colour of tired blue—and was great and empty. On the leaves of the acacia trees that grew here and there in the garden, the gentle rays of the afternoon sun fell forgivingly, as if the battle between heat and life, between red and green, was temporarily over.

“I am very happy that we can just sit here,” said Mma Ramotswe. “All the time these days it is work, work, work. We must be careful or we will work so much that we forget how to sit and talk about things.”

“You are right, Mma,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “But it is very hard, isn’t it? You can’t say to people: go away, we cannot help you. And I can’t say to people: I can’t fix your car. We cannot do that.”

Mma Ramotswe nodded. He was right, of course. Neither of them would want to turn people away, no matter how busy they were. So where did the solution lie? Should they allow the businesses to expand? This was one of the matters that she wished to discuss with him—this, and the difficult issue of Charlie and the older woman.