She looked at him quizzically. And then it dawned on her: he had acted for Violet Sephotho, or possibly for Mr. Kereleng. Again, this should not have surprised her. There were only so many lawyers in Gaborone, and only so many clients; the odds that he should have acted for either of them were small enough. Yet that gave rise to an immediate problem: as an attorney, he was bound by the rules of confidentiality, and he would therefore not be able to say anything about the matter.

“I do not want you to break a confidence, Rra,” she said. “I am a detective, and I understand professional confidentiality.”

The lawyer sighed. “Oh dear, Mma Ramotswe. This is very difficult. I have acted for this man, Kereleng. When he bought the house initially, it was in his name. Then he came to see me about some other problem he had—a problem with the manager of his bottle store—and he asked me about transferring the house to his fiancée. She is called Violet Sephotho, as you may know. I told him that there would be no problem about that. Then the fiancée came to see me and asked me to draw up the deed for him to sign. When I did that, I was acting for her, not for him. She was my client. That’s important, you know.”

Mma Ramotswe looked puzzled. “Why? What difference does it make?”

“Well,” said Mr. Bosilong, “she was my client, you see, and that meant I owed a duty to her. So when Mr. Kereleng came to see me later and said that he had changed his mind, I had to tell him that it was too late. He was not the client—she was. He asked me to give the deed back—it had not yet been sent to the land registry. I said I could not, as I had done that job for another client, Miss Sephotho.”

Mma Ramotswe was interested in one thing he had said. “You told me that the deed was not yet registered. Is that so?”

“Not yet,” he said. “I suppose I’ve been putting it off.” He paused, looking into Mma Ramotswe’s eyes. “Mma Ramotswe, can I trust you?”

“Of course you can, Rra.”

“No, I mean absolutely, completely trust you. One hundred per cent?”

“One hundred per cent, Rra. Anything you say to me will go no further.”

Mr. Bosilong looked about him, as if searching his office for eavesdroppers.

“What I am about to say must remain between us,” he said. “I think that this Miss Sephotho is dishonest. I think that she has prevailed on this man to give her this house pretending that she will marry him. But it is only a pretence.”

Mma Ramotswe laughed. “But I knew that all along, Rra. Everybody knows that—or just about everybody. Mr. Kereleng didn’t at first—now he does.”