‘Yes, but you have to be careful. Remember what Clovis Andersen says in the book? Remember how he says that the shirt a man wears is not always the shirt he would like to wear?’

Mma Makutsi remembered that. ‘Have you heard from him?’ she asked.

‘From?’

‘From Mr Andersen? I thought that perhaps he might have written again.’

‘No, he has not, Mma. He has many important things to do.’

There had been one letter since Clovis Andersen had returned to Muncie, Indiana. It had arrived shortly after his trip to Botswana had come to an end and it had been read and reread by both Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi before being filed away in a file specially devoted to it.

Dear ladies,

There are some letters that are easy to write and some that are hard. This is a hard letter, not because I have anything unpleasant to say – as some hard letters require – but because I am not sure that I can find the words to express what I feel I need to say. And that is to thank you not merely for all your kindness to me when I was in your wonderful country, but to thank you for helping me come to terms with what has happened to me and with who I am. I could say so much more about that, but I know that it would make you embarrassed. We Americans can sometimes say too much about how we are feeling when other people keep those things to themselves. So I will not say much more than I have said because I know that you will understand. Here may be a wide sea between us, and many thousand of miles of it, but that sea and those miles are nothing to true friends, which is what I hope you will allow me to call you.

Yours truly,

Clovis Andersen

Now Mma Makutsi mused, ‘I might write to him and tell him about my baby.’

In Mma Ramotswe’s view this was a good idea. ‘He would be very interested, Mma.’

‘Especially in the name,’ said Mma Makutsi.

Mma Ramotswe looked up. ‘You have chosen it now?’

Mma Makutsi nodded. ‘Phuti and I have agreed.’

Mma Ramotswe took a sip of her tea, glancing at Mma Makutsi over the rim of her cup. ‘And, Mma?’

‘Itumelang,’ said Mma Makutsi.

It was a reasonably common name in a country where names were highly individual and there were many thousands from which to choose.

‘It is a good name,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘Itumelang Radiphuti sounds very good to my ear, Mma.’ She paused. ‘Have there been many Itumelangs in Phuti’s family?’

‘His father’s brother,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘But that is not the reason we have chosen it. We like the name for its own sake.’

‘Of course.’

‘But he has other names too,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘His full name will be Itumelang Clovis Radiphuti.’