Mma Ramotswe suppressed a grin at the thought of demand feeding for husbands. The conversation, although potentially sensitive, had proved to be more amusing than anything else, and she knew that it could drift on indefinitely. It was her own dream that had started it, and it was to her dream that she now returned.

“I had a very strange dream last night, Mma,” she said. “As I was saying.”

“Please tell me what it was, Mma,” said Mma Makutsi. “I cannot guarantee that I will be able to tell you what it means, but we shall see.”

“I dreamed that I was walking along a path,” Mma Ramotswe began. “And—”

Mma Makutsi interrupted her. “That means you are going on a journey, Mma. There can be no doubt about that.”

Mma Ramotswe acknowledged this. “Possibly. But then the path came to a place—”

“That is your destination,” announced Mma Makutsi. “That place that you saw in your dream was your destination in life. That is very clear indeed. What was it like, Mma? Was it a very good place?”

“There was an acacia tree—”

Again there was an interjection. “Then that means you are going to end up under a tree, Mma. That is where you will find yourself, under a tree.” She looked at Mma Ramotswe sympathetically. “That is not too bad, Mma. There are many worse places to end up.”

“But the tree was not all that important,” said Mma Ramotswe, raising her voice slightly to prevent further interruption. “There was a man standing under the tree. It was as if he was waiting for me.”

“That will be Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni.”

Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “It was not him. It was a man I had never seen before. And he did not come from here. He was a stranger.”

Mma Makutsi’s glasses flashed in a slanting band of sunlight. “Not from Gaborone?” she asked. “Not from Botswana?”

“No. He was from somewhere else. He was not an African at all.”

Mma Makutsi was silent. Then she delivered her judgement. “You are going to meet a stranger,” she said, with an air of gravity. “You are going to meet a stranger under an acacia tree.”

“I thought it might mean something like that,” said Mma Ramotswe. “But then I thought that it probably didn’t mean anything at all. That it was just a dream, and I would forget about it by this afternoon.”

Mma Makutsi looked doubtful. “I don’t think you should forget it, Mma Ramotswe. I think that you should remember it, so that when it happens, when you meet that stranger under the acacia tree, you will be prepared.”