‘I have never met them,’ said Mma Potokwani. She took a small fragment of fruitcake from her plate – she was down to crumbs now. ‘But one of the housemothers here worked for them, I believe. She was with them for years before she came here.’

Mma Ramotswe was instantly alert. ‘Worked in the house?’

‘Yes. She was the cook at the farmhouse. I seem to remember her saying that they were good employees, but she wanted to move closer to town because her daughter and her grandchildren are in Gaborone.’

Mma Ramotswe replied that this was understandable, but her mind was elsewhere. She wanted to talk to this woman; would that be possible?

‘We can go and see her,’ said Mma Potokwani. ‘The housemothers are usually in the houses doing some cooking or keeping the place tidy. If she isn’t there, she won’t be far away.’

They finished their tea. The cake, Mma Ramotswe pronounced, was very much better for the additional sultanas and she ventured to suggest that even more might be added to good effect. Mma Potokwani considered this possibility and said that she would try. ‘There will be a limit, though,’ she pointed out. ‘A fruitcake must have some other fruit, not just sultanas, otherwise it becomes a sultana cake.’

They left the office and walked a short distance to one of the ten small houses that made up the children’s home. These houses were dotted about under the shade of large jacaranda trees from the limbs of which here and there hung a child’s swing. The lower boughs, bending under their own weight towards the ground, were clearly accustomed to being climbed upon by children, their bark scuffed here, polished there, by the limbs of young climbers. I used to climb trees, thought Mma Ramotswe. I used to climb trees and sit there for hours, watching. She smiled as the memory came back of the tree behind the school that they had all climbed until somebody fell out and broke a leg and the practice was banned. They had moved to other trees.

Mma Potokwani called out as they approached the small, well-swept veranda of the house: ‘Ko, ko! Ko, ko!’

The main door of the house was invitingly open; inside, another door slammed and the housemother emerged, a kitchen cloth in her hand. She greeted the matron respectfully before turning to Mma Ramotswe and greeting her too.

‘This is Mmamodise,’ said Mma Potokwani. ‘She is the housemother I told you about.’

Mmamodise gestured for them to go inside. ‘I have been cooking for the children,’ she said. ‘But everything is in the oven now.’

‘It smells very good,’ said Mma Ramotswe. And she suddenly remembered the sausages for Mr J. L. B. Matekoni. She must buy those on the way home.