The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party

by Alexander McCall Smith

  “People are happy for you, Mma,” Mma Ramotswe had said soothingly. “That is why they wish to come to your wedding.”

  “They like a large feast too,” said Mma Makutsi. “And free beer. That may be another reason why everybody wants to come.”

  She and Phuti talked about the guest list that night after the oxtail stew had been finished and the plates cleared away. Then Phuti raised the issue of the wedding dress. “You can have whatever you like, Grace,” he said. “There is a woman at the store who knows somebody who makes very fine wedding dresses. You can choose whatever you like.”

  Mma Makutsi looked down at the floor. She did not like to ask Phuti for money, and had been worried about the dress. “You will speak to this person?” she asked. “You will discuss the money?”

  He had sensed her embarrassment and had reached over to take her hand. “Of course I will. I will tell her that I will pay the bill.”

  “And shoes …”

  “You will certainly need special shoes,” said Phuti.

  “Mma Ramotswe has spoken about a pair she saw today. She said she thought they would be ideal—if they have them in my size.”

  “Then you must buy them,” said Phuti. “Get them soon. Tomorrow, even. The wedding date is coming soon.”

  She could not restrain herself, and leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. He seemed taken aback, and she heard him gasp. She pulled back, unsure of herself. She suddenly felt worried. Phuti had never been physically demonstrative with her. She had put this down to shyness on his part, something to do with his stutter, but now the thought crossed her mind: there were some men for whom the problem ran deeper. What if Phuti were to prove to be such a man?

  There were no words in the vocabulary of polite Botswana to express such an intimate matter. Women spoke among themselves of such things, and perhaps men did too. But it was not a subject that a couple like Mma Makutsi and Phuti Radiphuti could easily broach. Perhaps she could ask Mma Potokwane about it. It was too awkward a subject to raise with Mma Ramotswe, but Mma Potokwane was, after all, a qualified matron and had trained as a nurse—even if many years ago—at the Princess Marina Hospital. She would be able to speak to Phuti about such matters, perhaps, and make sure that everything was all right.

  Yes, she would ask her.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  YOU KNOW A GIRL CALLED PRUDENCE?

  IT WAS STRANGE, thought Mma Ramotswe, that you could go to sleep thinking one thing, and awake the following morning thinking quite another. And so it was with the question of Charlie.

  “I’ve changed my mind, Mma Makutsi,” she said in the office the following day. “We need to tackle Charlie. So let’s not put it off. You speak to him today.”

  Mma Makutsi needed no encouragement. “I am ready, Mma,” she said. “I will speak to him, but it will not just be me speaking.”

  Mma Ramotswe asked her what that meant. It would not just be her speaking, Mma Makutsi reiterated; it would be all the women of Botswana. “I shall be speaking on behalf of all the women of Botswana who have been let down by men,” she proclaimed. “On behalf of girls whose boyfriends have pretended that babies have nothing to do with them. On behalf of women whose men go off to bars all the time and leave them at home with the children. On behalf of women whose husbands see other women. On behalf of women whose husbands lie and steal their money and eat all the food and …”

  As she recited this litany of wrongs, the lenses of Mma Makutsi’s large glasses caught the light, sending flashes like warning semaphore messages across the room. Had a man been present, he would have cowered; as it was, there was only Mma Ramotswe to hear the charge, and she nodded her agreement, even if somewhat awed by her assistant’s fervour.

  “Don’t frighten him too much, Mma,” she said. “What you have said is true, but we must remember that Charlie is a young man still and young men—”

  “Should not be having twins,” shouted Mma Makutsi.

  Mma Ramotswe raised an eyebrow. “Yes, Mma, you are right. But he is not all bad. There is something in there that is good—we have all seen it. We need to remind him of his responsibilities. We need to encourage him to take them on his shoulders.” She watched her assistant as she spoke; she hoped that the decision to get Mma Makutsi to speak to Charlie was the right one. Her assistant was forceful and could be intimidating, but she was also closer to Charlie in age, and it was possible that he would be more prepared to listen to her than to Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni or to herself.

  “I will call him in now,” said Mma Makutsi.

  Mma Ramotswe asked her whether she wanted her to stay in the room or to find some excuse to go out.

  “You stay, Mma. Then you can speak too if he will not listen.”

  Mma Makutsi rose from her desk, adjusted her skirt, and crossed the room to the door that linked the office with the premises of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors beyond.

  “Charlie!” she called out. “You’re wanted in the office.”

  Charlie came in a few minutes later, wiping his hands. “Better be quick,” he said jauntily. “I’m working on a big, big car out there. Major technical problem. Ow! It’s no use me trying to explain it to you ladies—you wouldn’t understand.”

  Mma Makutsi glared at him. “Oh yes? So you think that we don’t understand mechanical things. Well, I can tell you, Charlie, there are other things that we do understand.”

  Charlie let out a whistle. “Keep your hair on, Mma. Only a little joke.”

  “Well this isn’t a joke, Charlie,” Mma Makutsi snapped back. “You know a girl called Prudence?”

  Charlie stiffened. The piece of paper towel on which he was wiping the grease from his hands fluttered slowly to the floor.

  Mma Makutsi’s voice rose. “Well?”

  “Maybe,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at Mma Ramotswe. “So what?”

  “Maybe?” mocked Mma Makutsi. “Maybe these days you don’t have to know people to have babies with them. Maybe you just have to maybe know them!”

  Charlie was silent. He looked up at the ceiling for a few moments, and then he looked down again. “You shut your face, you warthog! That is none of your business.”

  “But it is your business,” crowed Mma Makutsi. “It is your business to look after those twins. It is your business to support them. It is your business to stand by the mother. That is all your business. And Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni agrees.” Then she added, “And I am not a warthog.”

  Charlie looked dismayed. “You’ve told the boss?”

  “He knows,” said Mma Makutsi. “He knows. Mma Ramotswe, as you can see, knows. Everyone knows now, Charlie. All Botswana’s talking about it. And you can’t pretend that it’s nothing to do with you. And you know what else?”

  “What?” Charlie muttered. His confidence, it seemed, had suddenly deserted him.

  “Prudence is going to take you to court,” announced Mma Makutsi. “She is going to get an order for you to pay for the twins. And all the other expenses too. That will be for the next sixteen years. And we will all be witnesses in her case. Me, Mma Ramotswe, Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. Everybody.”

  “You cannot do that,” said Charlie weakly.

  “Yes, we can,” said Mma Makutsi. “You are caught now, Charlie. There is nothing you can do.”

  Charlie looked at Mma Ramotswe. His expression was crestfallen, desperate. “Mma Ramotswe …”

  Mma Ramotswe nodded. “I’m afraid that there is only one thing you can do, Charlie. Mma Makutsi is right. You can go and tell Prudence that you are sorry that you have deserted her, and that you are now ready to accept your responsibilities.”

  Charlie looked from Mma Ramotswe to Mma Makutsi. The large glasses caught a slanting beam of light from the window and flashed it back in his direction, as the beam of a hunter’s lamp may catch its terrified target. Then, quite suddenly, he lurched towards the door and struggled with the handle. His hands, still greasy from work, slipped, but on the third try he got the door open and lunged his w
ay through.

  “You cannot run away, Charlie!” Mma Makutsi shouted after him.

  “That seems to be what he’s doing,” said Mma Ramotswe. She looked reproachfully at Mma Makutsi. All that business about Prudence going to court was pure invention; she should have anticipated that her assistant would overdo things.

  “I think that I have got him to face up to his responsibilities,” said Mma Makutsi, taking off her glasses to polish them.

  A moment or two later, Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni came into the office. “Charlie has run away,” he said. “He’s gone. Right down the road.”

  “Perhaps he is running off to apologise to Prudence,” offered Mma Makutsi, replacing her glasses on her nose.

  “I’m not so sure,” said Mma Ramotswe.

  AFTER CHARLIE’S PRECIPITATE DEPARTURE it was difficult for Mma Ramotswe to concentrate on her work. Mma Makutsi had no such difficulty. She sat at her desk with a certain air of triumph, as judge and prosecutor rolled into one, pleased at the fact that Charlie had been confronted and dealt with so satisfactorily. The women of Botswana, her sisters in suffering, had been vindicated in those few well-chosen words delivered to Charlie, who had, in the whole business, been standing as a symbol—some might have said scapegoat—for centuries of accumulated male wrongdoing. Well, women had now had their say, through her lips; they had been given their day in court and had seen the defendant roundly and conclusively vanquished. There was nothing to regret in all this—it was simply a victory to be celebrated. Mma Ramotswe, for some odd reason, was silent, sitting at her desk somewhat morosely. Well, thought Mma Makutsi, her employer had always been too soft on Charlie—perhaps she was now feeling a bit sorry for him.

  “Are you upset over something, Mma Ramotswe?” asked Mma Makutsi.

  Mma Ramotswe looked up from the account ledger. It was time to send out bills, a task that she did not relish at the best of times, let alone now, in the aftermath of this furious row with Charlie. “A little upset,” she confessed. “As you may know, Mma, I don’t like conflict. It … it disturbs the air.”

  Mma Makutsi thought about this. “I see,” she said. “You heard him call me a warthog? Did you hear that, Mma?”

  Mma Ramotswe sighed. “Yes, I heard that.”

  “He has called me that before. Do you remember that time? He called me a warthog.”

  Mma Ramotswe did remember. It had been a most distressing occasion, and she had spoken to Charlie sharply about it, telling him that it was unacceptable to call Mma Makutsi anything, let alone a warthog.

  “Do I look like a warthog?” blurted out Mma Makutsi. “Do I deserve such an insult, Mma? For a second time?”

  Mma Ramotswe sought to reassure her assistant. “Of course not, Mma. Of course you don’t look like a warthog.”

  “Then why did he call me that?” demanded Mma Makutsi.

  Mma Ramotswe began an explanation. Young men used ridiculous insults for no real reason. They spoke without thinking. Charlie might call anybody a warthog; it was probably just the first disparaging word that came into his mind; he did not mean it, and she was sure that he would regret it when he realised that it had caused hurt and offence.

  Mma Makutsi listened to this explanation carefully. She took off her glasses again, polished them, and replaced them.

  “He meant it,” she pronounced.

  “Charlie needs to grow up,” said Mma Ramotswe. “And he will. It’s just that it’s taking rather a long time—just like his apprenticeship.”

  They both tried to return to work, but it was impossible. Mma Makutsi, from feeling pleased with the result of her accusation, now seethed at the memory of the insult; Mma Ramotswe, for her part, felt concerned not only about Charlie, but about Mma Makutsi too. It had not been handled well, she thought—and it was her own fault. She should have taken Charlie aside privately and tried to persuade him to do the right thing; it had been an error of judgement to let Mma Makutsi loose on him like that.

  Oh well, she thought; things sometimes did not turn out as we had hoped, and the only thing to do was to carry on regardless. If we stopped and brooded all the time over what went wrong, then we would never get anywhere with anything, and one could certainly not run a detective agency, or any business for that matter, in such a way. The day, she decided, would have to be restarted somehow, if it were to get anywhere.

  She looked up at Mma Makutsi. “Mma,” she said, “I have been thinking.”

  “And I have been thinking too,” interjected Mma Makutsi. “I have been thinking about this warthog business. When that young man comes back, I’m going to ask him why he called me that, and I will carry on asking him until he gives me a proper explanation.”

  “I haven’t been thinking about that,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I’ve been wondering whether we shouldn’t shut up shop for a while. Why don’t you go out and look at those shoes I mentioned to you? Try them on. Then go and have a cup of coffee—take the money for that from petty cash. I will pay. We can finish off these accounts some other time.”

  Mma Makutsi smiled. Mma Ramotswe always had a way of defusing a difficult situation; she never failed. “That is a good way of forgetting, Mma. And you are right—I should not sit here thinking about it and making myself all hot and bothered.” She paused. “But what about you, Mma?”

  Mma Ramotswe explained that she had work to do that would take her out of the office. She needed to go out to Mr. Moeti’s place, and there was nothing like a drive into the country to clear one’s head and get the small things of life into their proper perspective. Mma Makutsi agreed with all that, but suggested that Mma Ramotswe was overlooking something even better in terms of distraction and balm, and that was shopping for shoes. She pointed this out to Mma Ramotswe, who laughed, and said that each of us needed to find just the right way to take our mind off our problems, and it did not matter what that was—a drive in the country, an expedition to a shoe shop, a quiet cup of tea under a cloudless sky; each of us had something that made it easier to continue in a world that sometimes, just sometimes, was not as we might wish it to be.

  TO GET FROM THE OFFICES of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency to the Riverwalk shops—there was not much of a river, it was admitted by all—you could either take a crowded minibus from the side of the Tlokweng Road, and travel no more than a stop or two, or you could drive—if you had a car—or walk. Mma Makutsi could have asked Mma Ramotswe to take her in her van on the way to the Moeti place, and then to drop her off, but she decided instead that it would be better to walk. She was in no hurry to get back to the office, and a walk there and back would add an hour to the pleasant interlude that Mma Ramotswe had so generously arranged.

  She set off a few minutes after Mma Ramotswe, locking the office door behind her and leaving a notice pinned to it saying, Temporarily closed for investigations. She had been rather proud of this notice, which informed any prospective client that the detectives were somewhere else on unspecified but important-sounding investigative work. But as she pinned the sign into position, it suddenly occurred to her that a quite different impression might be created, namely that the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was itself under investigation, and consequently had been closed down by the authorities. That would never do, so she reopened the office and carefully typed out a new sign. The wording this time was far better, and, she hoped, quite unambiguous: Temporarily closed while detective personnel are engaged elsewhere. That was much better … or was it? Could it be read as suggesting that the entire staff of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was, in fact, working for some other concern? That was certainly not the message she wished to convey, so she inserted a third sheet of paper into the typewriter and typed: Back soon. There was no room for misunderstanding there, although there might be some people who demanded, “And what does ‘soon’ mean, may we ask? How soon is that?” Such people, however, would never be satisfied with whatever one said, and would always be picking holes in even the simplest notice. No, you did not need to worry about
people like that.

  Satisfied with the sign, she set off. As she reached the road that ran past Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, a struggling minibus, laden to the gunnels with passengers, and tilting dramatically to one side, started to swerve off the tarmac towards her. The driver had scented the prospect of yet another fare and was gesturing from behind the wheel. Mma Makutsi waved him on, and he resumed his journey in a belch of exhaust smoke. As the minibus went past, she saw people staring at her through the windows: a woman with a purple hat pulled down over her ears; a young girl on her mother’s lap, hair festooned with tiny ribbons worked carefully into the tight curls; an elderly man, his eyes closed, snatching a few moments of sleep on the journey. My people, she thought. My people. And she recalled that when she married Phuti Radiphuti she would never again have to travel by minibus, if that was what she wished. She would have a car, and she would be able to go where she wanted, when she wanted, and would not have others squashed in with her, would not have to put up with the discomfort of the elbows of complete strangers digging into one’s ribs, nor, even more disconcertingly, their breath hot on the back of one’s neck. That would all be a thing of the past—if that was what she wanted. And she was not sure that it was.

  She continued her walk. It was not too hot a day, and a breeze had stirred up from the west, from the direction of the Kalahari, the warm heart of the country. There were people who knew what such things meant, who could read the wind, but for Mma Makutsi it was just a breeze that had sprung up to make her walk to the shops that much more comfortable. She looked up. The sky was without cloud, a dome of lightest blue filled with air, great swirls and eddies of it, which you could see—just about—if you stared long enough. She breathed in deeply, and felt the fine dry air fill her with a buoyant optimism. Life was very good: she had behind her a career that was a success by anybody’s standards—ninety-seven per cent, associate detective with several significant and challenging cases solved, a new filing system worked out—a comfortable, if rather small, rented house, and now, to top all these achievements, a well-to-do fiancé who loved her and was kind to her in so many little ways. And here she was with three or four hours of time off—and she would not wish to hurry these things—on a mission to purchase shoes for her wedding.