Mr J. L. B. Matekoni shook his head. ‘That’s nonsense, Charlie. Women drivers are more careful than men. Men wreck their cars more often than women do, I’m afraid.’

Charlie laughed. ‘Good try, boss! But don’t worry, you can tell it like it is now that Miss Ninety-seven Per Cent is off having babies.’

Fanwell looked awkward. ‘I don’t know, Charlie. Maybe —’

‘And you don’t have to worry either,’ said Charlie. ‘She can’t hear you. You don’t have to be frightened of somebody who can’t hear you.’ He paused, his face breaking into a broad, mischievous smile. ‘I’m not afraid to say it: put me in the cab with a woman driver at the wheel and you’ll see me hop out pretty smartly.’

It was at that moment, within a second or two of his finishing, that the lightning struck. It did not hit the roof of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, even though its corrugated tin must have been a tempting target; it came to earth a short distance away, striking a small acacia tree and splitting its trunk neatly in two. The impact of the bolt shook the walls of the office, rattling the metal filing cabinet and causing a pane of glass in the window above Mma Ramotswe’s desk to crack. The clap of thunder that accompanied the strike rose briefly above the sound of the rain, and then died away. Now the steady sound of the falling rain asserted itself again.

Charlie stood quite still. He had dropped his mug of tea, and it lay shattered on the floor at his feet, steam rising from the spilled liquid.

Fanwell was staring at him. ‘You see,’ he said, half under his breath. ‘You see.’

Charlie opened his mouth but no intelligible sound emerged. Mma Ramotswe watched him, amused; it was costing her a great effort not to laugh.

‘Perhaps you should be a bit more careful of what you say, Charlie,’ she said at last. ‘You never know who’s listening, do you?’

Again Charlie started to say something, but again no words came. Mma Ramotswe reflected that it would be a very good story to relay to Mma Makutsi, but now there was a broken mug to be picked up off the floor, a pool of tea to be mopped up, and a trip to be made to the office of the Master of the High Court, the custodian and enforcer of the wills of Botswana.