Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni looked up at the sky. He thought that he had felt the first drop of rain, but it could not have been that, as the sky directly above was still clear. “How much does a miracle cost?” he asked.

“Twenty-five thousand pula,” said Dr. Mwata.

Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni was aware that Dr. Mwata was watching his reaction to this information. The doctor’s body, he thought, those long limbs, had become tense. And he noticed too that when he said, “Yes, I shall pay,” the tension disappeared, as if a taut string had suddenly been cut. But this means nothing, he told himself. If there was a chance of a miracle—the remotest chance—he would take it. And was it unreasonable that one should have to pay for a miracle, when all else in this life seemed to cost money, except love, perhaps, which cost nothing, could often be unconditional, and, what was more, made one want to believe in the possibility of miracles?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

A CONVERSATION ABOUT THE PAST

MMA RAMOTSWE had a living to be earned, of course: more than one, if one took into account Mma Makutsi’s salary as an associate detective and the contribution which the agency made to Mr. Polopetsi’s pay as a part-time helper, mostly in the garage but sometimes in the agency. That could change, thought Mma Ramotswe: if it was true that Mr. Polopetsi was the author of the anonymous letters, as she feared he was, he would have to go. Her earlier decision that she might respond to his treachery with love—a solution which had seemed attractive in that moment of peace on the hillside at Mochudi—had been replaced by a more realistic assessment of the situation. She did not relish the thought of dismissing him, but she saw no real alternative. One could not harbour a snake in the bosom of a business, no matter how charitable one felt, and no matter how understanding one was.

But now the immediate task was to attend to a matter that would bring in fees to keep everybody alive. Mma Sebina’s case was problematic: she could be lying, but so far Mma Ramotswe only had the word of that strange woman in Otse who claimed to have been present at the birth. Faced with these starkly contradictory testimonies, Mma Ramotswe had decided to work on the assumption that Mma Sebina was telling the truth and that the mother had done so too. Two testimonies to one; simple arithmetic, if nothing else, pointed in that direction. Of course, if she found somebody else who had light to throw on the mystery, then that might tip matters the other way. For all she knew, further inquiries might make the score two all, but time would settle that uncertainty.