She remembered suddenly what Dr. Moffat had told her when he had treated Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni for depression a few years earlier. “Sometimes this illness comes with periods of elation,” he had said. “A person can feel very excited, very cheerful. He can rush round on all sorts of wild schemes, thinking he can conquer the world. You have to watch for that.”

She had never seen that in Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, but now she found herself wondering whether this was what was happening. She tried to keep her voice steady as she told him that she was ready to listen; he could tell her whatever it was that he needed to tell her.

He looked her in the eyes. “I went to see this doctor,” he said.

He could take a long time to tell a story. Often there was a lot of background information before he got started. She would be patient. “Yes. The one with the car that wouldn’t start? You went to see him.”

“He is a good man,” he went on. “He was a doctor up in Selebi-Phikwe, at the mines, but now he is retired. He is living just outside town. Near David Mgang’s place. Out that way.”

There were some big houses out there, thought Mma Ramotswe. This doctor had done well for himself. But she did not say that; she just said, “Out there. I know that place.”

“Yes,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “He has a nice place out there. His wife is late, but he has a son and his son’s wife living with him, and there are many grandchildren. All in that house.”

“They must be happy,” said Mma Ramotswe. “It is a good thing to have one’s grandchildren around you when you have finished working. You can see the results of all your hard work then.”

He nodded, and then became silent. It was as if he was thinking about the grandchildren, and the rewards of hard work.

“So?” said Mma Ramotswe gently.

The verbal nudge seemed to focus him again. “Yes,” he said. “After I had got the car going, the doctor asked me whether I had a wife.”

Mma Ramotswe nodded encouragingly. “And you said?”

“I said, Yes, I have a wife.”

“I am relieved,” she said.

“And then he asked me whether I had any children. And I said there were no children of our own, but that we had the two foster children, and they were like a son and a daughter. I told him that Motholeli was in a wheelchair but that she was doing well. And then…”

She was watching him. Now his eyes seemed to light up with pleasure.

“And then?”