In normal circumstances, Mma Ramotswe would have felt obliged to refute this false philosophy, but not now. “Charlie,” she said, “why don’t you go and ask those men to put the bed safely in the garage? Just outside that door. It will be safe there.”

Mma Makutsi looked up in gratitude. “I won’t have to keep it there long, Mma,” she said. “Phuti will come and collect it in a few days.”

“Of course he will,” said Mma Ramotswe reassuringly. “In the meantime, you will get pleasure from seeing your fine purchase and thinking of how much money you saved—since it was a bargain. That’s the important thing. That will make you feel better.”

It did, immediately, and dictation was resumed. They had several letters to complete and a client was coming in half an hour. There would probably not even be time for tea before the client’s arrival, but the kettle could be put on once the client had arrived. People talked very freely and comfortably against the sound of a boiling kettle, Mma Ramotswe had found. And they talked even more willingly once they had been served a cup of tea, and the first sips had been taken, warming those regions of the heart that were burdened, that wanted to talk.

THE CLIENT’S PROBLEM, as it turned out, was very straightforward—a matter of a tenancy agreement in which the tenant had been substituted in spite of a term in the contract that this should not happen. The owner of the house had not met the original tenant, since she had been away when the original agreement was drawn up by her attorney. Now she had returned and wanted the house back. She had been reconciled to having to let the lease run for another year, but then a neighbour had let drop a nugget of information. “Your tenant,” she had said, “says that he is called Moganana. You think he is called that too. But I think that he is the brother-in-law of that Moganana, and that he works over at one of those businesses on the Francistown Road. I can show you the place.”

Mma Makutsi had drawn in her breath audibly at the deception. “That is cheating,” she muttered.

The client was pleased to find her own outrage endorsed; she did not like the thought that some people might find her selfish for wanting the tenant out. “You’re very right, Mma,” she said, looking over her shoulder at Mma Makutsi. “That is why I am keen to get this worthless person out of the house. I cannot have a cheat under my roof.”

We all need somewhere to live, thought Mma Ramotswe; but she did not say it.