At the mention of criminal activity, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni grimaced. He had taken those boys on several years ago, and he had imagined their involvement in all sorts of affairs with girls. He did not like to enquire about that, and it was their own business after all. But criminal activity was another matter. What if there were to be an article in the newspapers reporting that an apprentice from Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors had been arrested by the police in connection with some racket? The shame that this would bring on him would be too much to bear. His was a business dedicated to looking after customers and their cars, and doing so honestly. Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had never used cheap, unsuitable spare parts and then charged the customer for expensive, proprietary parts; he had never paid or accepted a bribe. He had done his best to instill this sense of morality—this commercial, or even mechanical, morality—in the boys, but he was not at all sure whether he had succeeded. He sighed again. These women were always pushing him into things against his will. He did not want to interfere with his tenant. He did not want to go back to his old house, now that he was so safely settled in the house at Zebra Drive. But it seemed that he was being given very little alternative, and so he agreed. They could go that evening, he conceded, shortly after five o’clock. Until then he wanted to work on these poor vehicles without interruption.

“I will not disturb you,” promised Mma Makutsi. “But at five o’clock I shall be standing here, ready to go.”

And at exactly five o’clock she waved goodbye to Mma Ramotswe as her employer drove off homewards in the tiny white van and she went to remind Mr J.L.B. Matekoni that it was time for them to go. He had just finished working on a car, and was in a cheerful mood, as the job had worked out well.

“I hope that we shall not have to be long,” he said as he wiped his hands on a piece of lint. “I do not have very much to say to that man who has rented my house. In fact, I have nothing to say to him at all.”

“We can say that we have come to see that everything is all right,” said Mma Makutsi. “And then we can say something about Charlie. We can ask him if he has seen Charlie.”

“I don’t see any point in that,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “If he has seen Charlie he will say yes, and if he has not seen him, then he will say no. What is the point of asking him this?”

Mma Makutsi smiled. “You are not a detective, Rra. I can tell that.”