They parked in front of the stoop, under a rough car shelter that Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had fashioned out of shade-netting. It was a large house by modern standards, built in a day when builders had no reason to worry about space. There was the whole of Africa in those days, most of it unused, and nobody bothered to save space. Now it was different, and people had begun to worry about cities and how they gobbled up the bush surrounding them. This house, a low, rather gloomy bungalow under a corrugated-tin roof, had been built for a colonial official in Protectorate days. The outer walls were plastered and whitewashed, and the floors were polished red cement, laid out in large squares. Such floors always seemed cool on the feet in the hot months, although for real comfort it was hard to better the beaten mud or cattle dung of traditional floors.

Mma Ramotswe looked about her. They were in the living room, into which the front door gave immediate entrance. There was a heavy suite of furniture—expensive in its day—but now looking distinctly down-at-heel. The chairs, which had wide wooden arms, were upholstered in red, and there was a table of black hardwood on which an empty glass and an ashtray stood. On the walls there was picture of a mountain, painted on dark velvet, a wooden kudu-head, and a small picture of Nelson Mandela. The whole effect was perfectly pleasing, thought Mma Ramotswe, although it certainly had that forlorn look so characteristic of an unmarried man’s room.

“This is a very fine room,” observed Mma Ramotswe.

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni beamed with pleasure. “I try to keep this room tidy,” he said. “It is important to have a special room for important visitors.”

“Do you have any important visitors?” asked Mma Ramotswe.

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni frowned. “There have been none so far,” he said. “But it is always possible.”

“Yes,” agreed Mma Ramotswe. “One never knows.”

She looked over her shoulder, towards a door that led into the rest of the house.

“The other rooms are that way?” she asked politely.

Mr J.L.B. Matekoni nodded. “That is the not-so-tidy part of the house,” he said. “Perhaps we should look at it some other time.”

Mma Ramotswe shook her head and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni realised that there was no escape. This was part and parcel of marriage, he assumed; there could be no secrets—everything had to be laid bare.

“This way,” he said tentatively, opening the door. “Really, I must get a better maid. She is not doing her job at all well.”

Mma Ramotswe followed him down the corridor. The first door that they reached was half open, and she stopped at the doorway and peered in. The room, which had obviously once been a bedroom, had its floors covered with newspapers, laid out as if they were a carpet. In the middle of the floor sat an engine, its cylinders exposed, while around it on the floor there were littered the parts that had been taken from the engine.