The guard clapped his hands together. “Exactly, Mma! So my job is…is…” He could not bring himself to say unnecessary; nobody can be expected to admit that his job is unnecessary.

“Ceremonial,” said Mma Ramotswe. “Your job is ceremonial.”

“That is what it is. Thank you, Mma.”

Mma Ramotswe acknowledged his thanks and moved on into the bank. Nearer pay day, at the end of the month, there would be long lines of people waiting for the tellers; now there were just a few customers at each of the windows. She looked around, made her way across the floor to a desk bearing a large Enquiries sign, and asked for Mr. Sekape.

The woman behind the desk picked up a telephone and spoke a few words into the receiver. “He will come down,” she said. “He is upstairs, Mma. But you have caught him just before he goes out for lunch.”

Mma Ramotswe took a few steps backwards and waited. It is my job, she told herself; I am just doing my job. But the significance of what she was about to tell Mr. Sekape made her heart beat faster, her mouth feel dry.

SHE TOLD HIM that she had some news for him, that it was not bad news, but that she would need to talk to him outside. Could he join her out in the square? As they walked, they could talk. He was not to be alarmed; it was something that she thought he would be happy to hear.

He was not alarmed, nor even surprised by her request. In a country where news was often conveyed by messenger, it was not unusual for a stranger to announce that there was something they needed to discuss. There were a hundred things that might be talked about on such an occasion: difficulties with marriage negotiations, problems over the custody or education of a child, matters relating to cattle; it could be anything.

“It’s getting hotter,” said Mr. Sekape as they moved out from the shade of the bank building. “There will be more rain soon, I think.”

“I hope so,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I was on the Lobatse Road the other day and there was a lot of green. And the dam too—I have read in the newspapers that the level is getting higher.”

“That is all very good,” said Mr. Sekape. “This is all very good news.”

But it is not this news that you have brought me, Mma, he thought. You have not come to talk about the rains.