‘And you weren’t funny, Rra,’ she said, her tone still icy. ‘You’ll see that I am not laughing. And neither is anybody else in the class laughing.’ She scanned the rows of faces. Mr J. L. B. Matekoni looked down at the floor, wondering whether he could slip out unnoticed. Being at the back of the class, he was close to the door, but Keitumeste had closed it when she entered and he thought it would be impossible to leave without being spotted and challenged.

The course began. There was a short introductory lecture from Keitumeste on how she had been brought up in a patriarchal household but had freed herself from all that and made a marriage in which everything was shared equally with her husband. He, however, was an unusual man and she realised shortly after she married him that there were very few men like him in Botswana. At this, she looked sternly at the class members once again. Several nodded their heads in enthusiastic assent.

‘My mission,’ she went on, ‘is to help the men of Botswana to change. That is what God has called me to do, and that is what I shall do.’

The mention of God made Mr J. L. B. Matekoni frown. In his experience, people were always claiming that God agreed with them even when there was little or no evidence that this was the case. And anybody could say that God had called him to do what he did – even burglars. ‘God has called me to break into houses,’ such a man might say. ‘That is the work He planned for me.’ Of course, if he said that to a judge, then the judge might say, ‘And He has called me to send you to prison.’

No, thought Mr J. L. B. Matekoni – people should be careful about claiming authority that they did not have. It was the same with Mma Ramotswe and Seretse Khama, he reflected – not disloyally, of course. She was always claiming that Seretse Khama believed this, that and the next thing, whether or not there was any indication that he had ever even considered the matter on which she was pronouncing. But that was such a small fault, and rather an endearing one at that…

‘Now, before we go any further,’ continued Keitumeste, ‘I should like to carry out a little test. May I have a show of hands, please, on the following: firstly, how many of you consider yourselves to be modern men?’

She looked about her. A hand went up in the front – very tentatively – and then another one in the second row, and a few more in the third. Men looked around and, seeing hands go up, followed suit. Mr J. L. B. Matekoni did not consider himself to be a modern man – not yet – and so he felt he simply could not make the claim.