Mma Ramotswe smiled. She had read in a magazine recently that every business should have a mission statement. She liked the sound of that—a mission statement sounded very purposeful. She had discussed the matter with Mma Makutsi, who had been in strong agreement. “At the Botswana Secretarial College,” she said, “they told us to set goals. They said: Put your goals into words—you cannot have goals without words. That is when I made my first mission statement, Mma.”

“And what is that, Mma Makutsi?”

The reply came quickly. “It’s confidential, Mma.”

Mma Ramotswe had been surprised. The whole point of a mission statement, she had thought, was that you declared your purpose to the world. You judged yourself by it, yes, but far more importantly you invited others to judge you by the extent to which you lived up to your professed aims. So when the Botswana Power Corporation printed its mission statement on their customers’ bills, it was to let everybody know that Getting Power to You was what they wanted, above all else, to do. That was a modest enough goal, after all; it was not as if they said Lighting Up the Whole World or something of that sort.

But a confidential mission statement? That, surely, would encourage speculation that something underhand, or even threatening, was being planned. To Get to the Top at Any Cost—there were people who behaved as if that was their mission statement, and perhaps that was exactly what it was. Did Mma Makutsi have a mission statement like that? No, on balance she thought not. It would be something to do with filing; Mma Makutsi had an intense interest in filing and often talked about its finer points. Perhaps her mission statement, then, was To Put Things in the Right Place. But if that was what it was, then why keep it confidential? Nobody was threatened by one who wanted to file documents correctly, unless you were one of those people who wanted things to be in the wrong place—if there were such people. And then she had thought of Violet Sephotho: now there was somebody who would definitely have to keep her mission statement confidential, involving, as it no doubt did, goals far too shameful to be revealed, goals related to the number of husbands stolen, or some such thing.

She became aware that Mr. Polopetsi was addressing her.

“That tie will suit Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni very well, Mma. He’ll look very smart.”

She handed over a few banknotes to the trader, who counted out her change.

“It’s not for him,” said Mma Ramotswe. “It’s a present for you, Mr. Polopetsi.”

She handed the tie to him. His mouth was wide open in astonishment.

“There you are, Rra,” said the trader. “This is a very kind lady. I can tell.”