The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon

by Alexander McCall Smith

  The effect of this showed even before Mma Ramotswe had finished speaking. Mmamodise clapped a hand to her mouth. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Oh! So they know.’

  Now it was Mma Ramotswe who hesitated. Let somebody think you know what you don’t know, Clovis Andersen had written. Then it will all come out. But should she apply that technique – that trick – to this good woman, this kind and conscientious housemother?

  She did not have to answer her own question, as Mmamodise continued of her own accord. ‘I knew all about it, Mma. I knew because I was living in that house, and you hear things. But I never spoke to anybody about it – never.’

  ‘That is very good of you, Mma. But now…’

  ‘Now everybody is talking about it, you say.’

  ‘I didn’t say that, Mma. I said that a lawyer had asked me to look into it.’

  Mmamodise was anguished. ‘It is not his fault. How can it be a child’s fault?’

  ‘It is never the child’s fault,’ said Mma Ramotswe, wondering what fault was being talked about. ‘It is always the fault of the adults.’

  ‘But sometimes it isn’t the mother’s fault,’ said Mmamodise.

  ‘No, that is true. The mother is not always to blame.’

  ‘She was very young.’

  Mma Ramotswe wondered who: the aunt? ‘Rra Edgar’s sister?’

  The answer Mmamodise gave was crucial, and it was a single word. ‘Yes.’

  ‘She is the mother of Liso.’

  A nod of the head confirmed that. ‘When they discovered that she was pregnant,’ Mmamodise continued, ‘they sent her up to Francistown to get her as far away as possible. They did not want the child to be born on the farm.’

  Mma Ramotswe thought quickly. ‘And then they sent the boy to Swaziland?’

  Mmamodise shook her head. ‘No, he stayed in Botswana. He never went to Swaziland. There was a boy in Swaziland – he was the son of Rra Edgar’s brother, the one he had fought with. Nobody here ever met that boy. He was killed in the accident that killed his father, but nobody ever told Rra Edgar that. His sister kept it from him. He thought his nephew in Swaziland was still alive.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Later on, Rra Edgar’s sister told Rra Edgar that she had heard from the mother of that boy, their nephew, in Swaziland and he was coming to visit them. He was very pleased with that, and he was happy when a boy called Liso arrived. But it was not the son of his brother he was meeting. Although he did not know it, he was meeting the son of his sister.’

  ‘So where had this boy been?’

  ‘After the old man – the father of Rra Edgar and his sister – had sent the sister away, her little boy had been kept up north with some people the old man knew. He paid them to look after this boy, because he was so ashamed of him. He never saw his grandson – not once.’

  Mma Ramotswe now felt that she understood. She imagined the situation: the old man – the one who had been in politics – discovered that his teenage daughter was pregnant. Feeling ashamed and angry, he sent her up to the north of the country to have the baby, and the baby remained there in the care of others. After the old man’s death, the daughter wanted to bring her little boy down to the farm but did not want, for whatever reason, to let her brother Edgar know that she had had a child; perhaps, once again, it was shame over the very early pregnancy. When she learned that the nephew in Swaziland, the second brother’s child and the real nephew of both siblings, had died, she saw her chance and brought her own son down from the north, passing him off as the nephew, Liso. Because Rra Edgar had never met his nephew in Swaziland, he had no reason to doubt the identity of this Liso who came to stay. As far as he was concerned, this was the son of his brother.

  Mma Ramotswe looked at Mmamodise. ‘So this boy who is on the farm now – this Liso – came down to the farm because his mother was there? His real mother?’

  ‘Yes. And his father.’

  Mma Ramotswe was silent. She knew nothing of the father, but said, ‘Of course.’

  Mmamodise’s expression suddenly became one of distaste. ‘I am not saying that I approve of what happened. It was very bad. But you should not punish the boy.’

  ‘The father…’

  ‘Rra Edgar.’

  Mma Ramotswe stared at her. ‘No, the father…’

  ‘Yes, that’s right: Rra Edgar, the father.’

  Mma Ramotswe gasped. Mma Potokwani, who had stopped looking at the ceiling, was staring incredulously at the housemother.

  ‘His sister,’ muttered Mma Ramotswe.

  ‘It was very shameful,’ said Mmamodise. She frowned. ‘But you knew this, Mma. This lawyer you mentioned knows all this?’

  ‘We suspected something,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘I did not expect that.’

  Mmamodise turned away. Her voice was trembling. ‘I am very ashamed of myself. I thought you knew. Now I have told you something that should be kept very secret, Mma. I have spoiled that.’

  ‘No, Mma,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘You did not do that deliberately. And I promise you, I shall not speak of this to anybody.’ She turned to Mma Potokwani. ‘And you will say the same, won’t you, Mma Potokwani?’

  Mma Potokwani nodded. ‘I shall not speak of this either.’

  Mmamodise seemed reassured. ‘It was a terrible thing. I know about it because I was there when it happened. I was in the house and I heard the voices and all the crying. The old man was still alive and he said that this would kill him. I think it made his death come earlier.’

  ‘Does the boy know?’ asked Mma Ramotswe.

  ‘He does not know. He thinks that his father is a man who worked on the farm and then left.’

  There was another question for Mma Ramotswe to ask. ‘And Rra Edgar? He knew?’

  Mmamodise shook her head. She spoke with some embarrassment now and Mma Ramotswe understood; people like Mmamodise did not like talking about such matters. And she would not press her. Why should people not have their realms of privacy and reticence?

  ‘When it happened, the old man did not want his son Edgar to know that he was becoming a father. It was too shameful. You see, Mma, what I heard was this: the girl confessed to her father that she had shared a blanket with the brother just once. That was all. I don’t think that Rra Edgar ever knew that the consequence of what he had done was the sister’s pregnancy. You see, Mma, I don’t think any of them could face it.’

  Mma Ramotswe nodded. She noticed that Mmamodise had used the old-fashioned expression – to share a blanket. It was how people spoke of these things.

  ‘I see,’ she said. She knew now. It was shame, and an understandable shame at that.

  They sat in silence for a while; nobody seemed to want to say anything. The disclosure had been so powerful that Mma Ramotswe and Mma Potokwani were shocked into speechlessness. And for her part, Mmamodise was wrestling with guilt over having revealed the painful secret. Mma Ramotswe could tell that, and she reached over and touched the housemother on the arm.

  ‘Do not be upset, Mma,’ she whispered. ‘What has happened has happened. The boy is not to blame. And now he will be getting something that will make up for it. That can happen in life, Mma, can’t it? Things start badly – very badly – and then they change for the better and those who have nothing, or who are unhappy, or who live in fear, suddenly find that these things that were bad for them have gone.’

  ‘It’s like rain,’ said Mma Potokwani, who had not said much but had clearly been affected by the story. ‘The rains come and they wash everything away. The dryness, the thirst, the dust on your skin – these are washed away, Mma, all washed away.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Best Woman in Botswana

  When he arrived in his carrycot at the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency the following morning, Itumelang Clovis Radiphuti was wearing a red baby outfit with a jaunty matching cap. Charlie wriggled out from under a car to greet him.

  ‘I see you, my brother!’ he shouted. ‘I see you, Itumelang Cl…’ He tur
ned to Mma Makutsi. ‘What’s the rest of it, Mma?’

  ‘Itumelang Clovis Radiphuti,’ said Mma Makutsi obligingly. She usually addressed Charlie with a note of irritation in her voice, but now that he was showing such attachment to her son her tone was more forgiving.

  ‘Itumelang Clovis Radiphuti,’ repeated Charlie, reaching out to stroke him. ‘A big, important name for a big, important young man!’

  ‘Don’t touch him, Charlie,’ said Mma Makutsi, pointing at his hands. ‘You’re covered in grease.’

  Charlie looked down at his hands, as if he would be surprised at the suggestion of grease. ‘I have been thinking about him, Mma,’ he said. ‘I’ve been thinking that he could be a mechanic when he grows up. He could be my apprentice.’

  Mma Makutsi’s eyes widened. ‘Your apprentice? But…’ She did not finish her sentence. She had been about to say that Charlie might not have finished his own apprenticeship in sixteen years’ time. But she decided not to.

  ‘Lovely boy,’ Charlie crooned, looking admiringly at the baby. ‘Who’s the most handsome baby in Gaborone – in all Botswana? You are! Yes, you!’

  Mma Makutsi smiled as she went into the office to put Itumelang into his office cot. This enthusiasm for babies on Charlie’s part was most unexpected but very welcome. Of course, if it got out that Charlie was looking for a wife and was prepared to have a baby and stay, then there would be no shortage of suitable young women. Charlie might be trampled in the rush and go to the altar covered in sticking plasters where the girls had tried to grab hold of him. She smiled at the thought.

  ‘Something funny, Mma Makutsi?’

  Mma Ramotswe was already behind her desk, the day’s newspaper spread out in front of her.

  ‘I was thinking of Charlie,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘He is very keen on Itumelang. I was thinking of how quickly Charlie would be snapped up if the girls heard that he was interested in marriage.’

  ‘Very quickly, I’d say,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘For all his faults, Charlie is a very good-looking young man. And he’s good fun to be with.’

  ‘Within reason,’ said Mma Makutsi.

  Once Itumelang was settled, Mma Makutsi took her place at her desk and looked over the room towards Mma Ramotswe. They had business to discuss, and they launched straight into it. Mma Ramotswe, somewhat breathlessly, told Mma Makutsi about the events of the previous day and the unexpected breakthrough in the Molapo enquiry. She was shocked, just as Mma Ramotswe and Mma Potokwani had been, but saw how the whole thing now made sense.

  ‘That is a dreadful story,’ she said at the end of Mma Ramotswe’s account. ‘To think that such things happen.’

  ‘Everything happens,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘Sooner or later, just about everything happens.’

  ‘And that boy not knowing the truth,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘There he is going through life not knowing who he really is.’

  ‘He thinks he knows,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘And surely that’s what counts. We need a story about ourselves, but does it really matter whether it is the true one or it has been made up? I wonder.’

  ‘You mean, as long as we believe it ourselves?’

  She had not thought it through, but she imagined that this was so. ‘At the end of the day, Mma Makutsi, aren’t we all the same? Aren’t we simply people? Aren’t we all distant cousins from long, long ago?’

  ‘We all came from Africa,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘It doesn’t matter what the colour of our skin is; we’re all from Africa originally. I have read that, Mma Ramotswe. There was an article about it in the paper. East Africa. That’s where everyone comes from. Me, you, the King of Sweden.’

  ‘The King of Sweden?’

  ‘I choose him as an example,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘I’m not saying that he had an African grandmother, but a long, long time ago his people would have been from Africa, same as everybody.’

  Mma Ramotswe grinned. ‘So there were these Swedens in Kenya – just ordinary farmers…’

  ‘Cattle,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘They had many cattle, those people over there. They wore long red cloaks and looked after their cattle. I have seen photographs.’

  ‘And that Sweden family?’

  ‘They were there too. And the Arabs. And the Jews. Everyone. No enemies in those days.’

  Mma Ramotswe looked doubtful. ‘I’m not so sure, Mma. I don’t think human nature has changed. We have always been unkind to one another.’

  ‘And good sometimes.’

  ‘Yes, and good sometimes.’

  Mma Ramotswe returned to the topic of Liso. ‘The truth, Mma Makutsi, is that it doesn’t matter in the slightest that that boy has a father who is also his uncle. We do not like things like that, but once it has happened it makes no difference to that boy himself. We must love him the same as we love everybody else. That is all there is to it.’

  Mma Makutsi agreed. But she asked what this meant in practical terms. What were they going to say to Mma Sheba, who had asked them to investigate in the first place?

  Mma Ramotswe took a deep breath. There were moments when one knew that a few words uttered could change somebody’s life.

  ‘We tell her that the boy on the farm is the boy Rra Edgar had in mind when he made the will. He is the person whom he wanted to inherit. That is very clear.’

  ‘The will says that the farm must go to his nephew…’

  ‘Who is late.’

  Mma Makutsi was still concerned. ‘Yes, but if the real Liso is late, then the farm goes to Mma Sheba. That is what the will says. It says that the farm is to go to his nephew, Liso. We know that nephew is dead, and so the legacy cannot be executed. It goes into the residue.’

  ‘Yes, but when he said “my nephew”, he didn’t mean his real nephew Liso, he meant his son, Liso,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘He meant the Liso he knew. The Liso who was his son, but who he thought was his nephew. That’s what he wanted.’

  ‘But would the courts agree with that?’

  Mma Ramotswe was not sure. She wondered whether a court would try to work out what Rra Edgar had wanted. If they did that, then Liso – the Liso on the farm – would inherit. But the law was not always reasonable, and there might be reasons why a court might not try to work it out. It was best not to risk it, she thought.

  ‘The right thing,’ she said, ‘is for Liso to get the farm. It is what Rra Edgar intended.’

  Mma Makutsi was ready to be persuaded. ‘And it’s only fair too, don’t you think, Mma? The farm is going to his child, as is right. We should do nothing to change that.’

  ‘So we will not be lying to Mma Sheba if we tell her what I suggested,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘We tell her that Liso is the young man Rra Edgar was thinking of when he made the will. That is absolutely true, Mma Makutsi. One hundred per cent true. We don’t have to tell her anything else we happen to have found out. She will have to do what the will says.’

  ‘She won’t like that, Mma.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter. We all have to do things we don’t like. You had to be polite to that aunt of Phuti’s. You did it. You put up with her.’

  ‘That snake, Mma, it did us a big favour. Maybe it knew all about difficult aunts. Maybe it had a very nasty snake aunt who was always hissing.’

  Mma Ramotswe laughed. ‘Yes, maybe.’ She became serious again. ‘It’s sad, isn’t it, Mma, that a person can feel so ashamed of something that they can never talk about it. That woman on the farm – the mother – she has spent her life being frightened that her secret will be found out. That cannot be easy.’

  ‘She is frightened more for the boy than for herself, I think,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘But it is equally sad.’

  ‘That is why I am pleased that they will get the farm. He will be a good farmer and she will be there watching him look after his father’s place. That is a good result, Mma.’

  ‘And Mma Sheba?’ asked Mma Makutsi.

  ‘She has enough money, I think – she does not need more. And she has her sadness, too, like the rest of us.’
/>   ‘Because Rra Edgar is late?’

  Mma Ramotswe nodded. ‘She has lost him. But she does not need his farm to be able to remember him. She does not need that.’

  And now they had to tell Mma Soleti that they had identified the person who was waging the campaign against her: Violet Sephotho. Mma Makutsi was looking forward to this and to the subsequent denunciation – to Violet’s face – that she had been taking great pleasure in planning. Mma Ramotswe was more hesitant. She was prepared to be firm when firmness was required, but she did not like confrontation if she could possibly avoid it.

  They left the office with Itumelang Clovis Radiphuti sound asleep in the small baby-seat that Phuti had bought and that strapped neatly into the passenger seat of the tiny white van, with Mma Makutsi herself travelling in the back. When they arrived, the infant was removed from the seat and tied firmly into a traditional African baby sling on his mother’s back. Some mothers, Mma Ramotswe had noticed, were beginning to use front slings, but this seemed to her to be all wrong. Babies had always been carried on their mothers’ backs in Africa, and it would be very confusing for everybody if they were to be carried in the front. What if the mother fell? She would fall on top of the baby. What if she were hit by one of those thorny branches while walking along a path through the bush? The baby would feel the thorns first. There were many arguments for the traditional approach, and she was pleased that she did not have to raise any of them with Mma Makutsi.

  They went straight to the Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon. Mma Soleti was there, together with a young woman whom she introduced as her cousin’s daughter, whom she had agreed to train as a beautician. Both looked despondent. When they saw Mma Makutsi’s baby, however, they cheered up immediately and spent some time cuddling him and exchanging baby gossip with Mma Makutsi. There were tips to be given on the care of the delicate skin that babies had, and several special creams were produced and demonstrated on Itumelang, with the result that his face was soon quite pale with all the creams and potions applied.