The Full Cupboard of Life

by Alexander McCall Smith

  “So I decided—together with some friends,” continued Mr Bobologo, “that we should do something ourselves. And that is how we started the House of Hope.”

  Mma Ramotswe listened politely as Mr Bobologo listed the difficulties he had encountered in finding a suitable building for the House of Hope and how eventually they had obtained a ruinously expensive lease on a house near the African Mall. It had three bedrooms and a living room which was not enough, he explained, for the fourteen girls who lived there. “Sometimes we have even had as many as twenty bad girls in that place,” he said. “Twenty girls, Mma! All under one roof. When it is that full, then there is not enough room for anybody to do anything. They must sleep on the floor and doubled-up in bunks. That is not a good thing, because when things get that crowded they run away and we have to look for them again and persuade them to come back. It is very trying.”

  Mma Ramotswe was intrigued. If the girls ran away, then it implied that they were kept there against their will, which surely could not be the case. You could keep children in one place against their will, but you could not do that to bar girls, if they were over eighteen. There were obviously details of the House of Hope which would require further investigation.

  “Would you show me this place, Rra?” she asked. “I can drive you down there in my van if you would show me. Then I will be able to understand the work that you are doing.”

  Mr Bobologo seemed to weigh this request for a moment, but then he rose to his feet, taking his glasses off and stowing them in his top pocket. “I am happy to do that, Mma. I am happy for people to see what we are doing so that they may tell other people about it. Perhaps they will even tell the Government and persuade them to give us money so that we can run the House of Hope on a proper basis. There is never ever enough money, and we have to rely on what we can get from churches and some generous people. The Government should pay for this, but do they help us? The answer to that, Mma, is no. The Government is not concerned about the welfare of ladies in this country. They think only of new roads and new buildings. That is what they think of.”

  “It is very unfair,” agreed Mma Ramotswe. “I also have a list of things that I think the Government should do.”

  “Oh yes?” said Mr Bobologo. “And what is on your list, Mma?”

  This question caught Mma Ramotswe by surprise. She had spoken of her list idly, as a conversational ploy; there was no list, really.

  “So?” pressed Mr Bobologo. “So what is on this list of yours, Mma?”

  Mma Ramotswe thought wildly. “I would like to see boys taught how to sew at school,” she said. “That is on my list.”

  Mr Bobologo stared at her. “But that is not possible, Mma,” he said dismissively. “That is not something that boys wish to learn. I am not surprised that the Government is not trying to teach boys this thing. You cannot teach boys to be girls. That is not good for boys.”

  “But boys wear clothes, do they not, Rra?” countered Mma Ramotswe. “And if these clothes are torn, then who is there to sew them up?”

  “There are girls to do that,” said Mr Bobologo. “There are girls and ladies. There are plenty of people in Botswana to do all the necessary sewing. That is a fact. I am a very experienced teacher and I know about these matters. Do you have anything else on your list, Mma?”

  There would have been a time when Mma Ramotswe would not have allowed this to pass, but she was on duty now, and there was no need to antagonise Mr Bobologo. She owed it to her client to find out more about him, and that was a more immediate duty than her duty to the women of Botswana. So she merely looked up at the sky, as if looking for inspiration.

  “I would like the Government to do many things,” she said. “But I do not want to make them too tired. So I shall have to think about my list and make it a bit smaller.”

  Mr Bobologo looked at her approvingly. “I think that is very wise, Mma. If one asks for too many things at the same time, then one does not usually get them. If you ask for one thing, then you may get that one thing. That is what I have found in life.”

  “Ow!” exclaimed Mma Ramotswe. “You are a clever man, Rra!”

  Mr Bobologo acknowledged the compliment with a brief nod of the head, and then indicated that he was now ready to follow Mma Ramotswe to the van. She stood aside and invited him to precede her, as was proper when dealing with a teacher. Whatever Mr Bobologo might prove to be like, he was first and foremost a teacher, and Mma Ramotswe believed very strongly that teachers should be treated with respect, as they always had been before the old Botswana morality had started to unravel. Now people treated teachers like anybody else, which was a grave mistake; no wonder children were so cheeky and ill-behaved. A society that undermined its teachers and their authority only dug away at its own sure foundations. Mma Ramotswe thought this was obvious; the astonishing thing was that many people simply did not understand that this was the case. But there was a great deal that people did not understand and would only learn through bitter experience. In her view, one of these things was the truth of the old African saying that it takes an entire village to raise a child. Of course it does; of course it does. Everybody in a village had a role to play in bringing up a child—and cherishing it—and in return that child would in due course feel responsible for everybody in that village. That is what makes life in society possible. We must love one another and help one another in our daily lives. That was the traditional African way and there was no substitute for it. None.

  IT WAS only a few minutes’ drive from the teachers’ quarters to the House of Hope, a drive during which Mr Bobologo held on firmly to the side of the passenger seat, as if fearing that any moment Mma Ramotswe would steer the tiny white van off the road. Mma Ramotswe noticed this, but said nothing; there were some men who would never be happy with women drivers, even although the statistics were plain for them to see. Women had fewer accidents because they drove more sedately and were not trying to prove anything to anybody. It was men who were the reckless drivers—particularly young men (such as the apprentices) who felt that girls would be more impressed by speed than by safety. And it was young men in red cars who were the most dangerous of all. Such people were best given a wide berth, both in and out of the car.

  “That is the House of Hope,” said Mr Bobologo. “You can park under the tree here. Carefully, Mma. You do not wish to hit the tree. Careful!”

  “I have never hit a tree in my life,” retorted Mma Ramotswe. “But I have known many men who have hit trees, Rra. Some of those men are late now.”

  “It may not have been their fault,” muttered Mr Bobologo.

  “Yes,” said Mma Ramotswe evenly. “It could have been the fault of the trees. That is always possible.”

  She was incensed by his remark and struggled to contain her anger. Unfortunately, her battle with her righteous indignation overcame her judgment, and she hit the tree; not hard, but with enough of a jolt to make Mr Bobologo grab onto his seat once again.

  “There,” he said, turning to her in triumph. “You have hit the tree, Mma.”

  Mma Ramotswe turned off the engine and closed her eyes. Clovis Andersen, author of her professional vade mecum, The Principles of Private Detection, had advice which was appropriate to this occasion, and Mma Ramotswe now called it to mind. Never allow your personal feelings to cloud the issue, he had written. You may be seething with anger over something, but do not—and I repeat not—do not allow it to overcome your professional judgment. Keep your calm. That is the most important thing. And if you find it difficult, close your eyes and count to ten.

  By the time she reached ten, Mr Bobologo had opened his door and was waiting for her outside. So Mma Ramotswe swallowed hard and joined him, following him up the short garden path that led to the doorway of an unexceptional white-washed house, of much the same sort as could be seen on any nearby street, and which from the road would never have been identified—without special knowledge—as a house of hope, or indeed of despair, or of anything else for th
at matter. It was just a house, and yet here it was, filled to the brim with bad girls.

  “Here we are, Mma,” said Mr Bobologo as he approached the front door. “Take up hope all you who enter here. That is what we say, and one day we shall have it written above the door.”

  Mma Ramotswe looked at the unprepossessing door. Her reservations about Mr Bobologo were growing, but she was not quite sure why this should be so. He was irritating, of course, but so were many people, and being irritating was not enough for him to be written off. No, there was something more than that. Was it smugness, or singularity of purpose? Perhaps that was it. It was always disconcerting to meet those who had become so obsessed with a single topic that they could not see their concerns in context. Such people were uncomfortable company purely because they lacked normal human balance, and this, she thought, might be the case with Mr Bobologo. And yet she had not been asked to find out whether Mr Bobologo was an interesting man, or even a nice man. She had been asked to find out whether he was after Mma Holonga’s money. That was a very specific question, and her feelings for Mr Bobologo had nothing to do with the answer to that question. So she would give him the benefit of the doubt, and keep her personal opinions to herself. She herself would never marry Mr Bobologo—or any man like him—but it would be wrong of her to interfere until she had very concrete proof of the exact issue at stake. And that had not yet appeared, and might never appear. So for the time being, the only thing to do was to concentrate on inspecting the House of Hope and wait until Mr Bobologo put a foot wrong and gave himself away. And she had a feeling now—a fairly strong feeling—that he might never do that.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  MR J.L.B. MATEKONI RECEIVES THE BUTCHER’S CAR; THE APPRENTICES RECEIVE AN ANONYMOUS LETTER

  WHILE MMA RAMOTSWE was visiting Mr Bobologo and his House of Hope, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni was completing a tricky repair at Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors. He was relieved, of course, about the cancellation of the parachute jump, but at the same time he was concerned about the fact that one of the apprentices was going to do it in his stead. He knew that these boys were feckless, and he knew that they would do anything to impress girls, but he was their apprentice-master, after all, and he considered that he had a moral responsibility for them until they had served out their apprenticeship. Many people would say that this did not extend to cover what they did in their own time, but Mr J.L.B. Matekoni was not one to take a narrow view of these matters and he could not avoid feeling at least slightly paternal towards these young men, irritating though they undoubtedly were. He was not sure, though, how he could deal with this issue. If he persuaded the young man not to jump, then Mma Potokwane might insist that he do the jump after all. If she did so, then that would lead to a row between her and Mma Ramotswe, and that could become complicated. There might be no more fruit cake, for example, and he would miss his trips out to see the orphans, even if he was inevitably given some task to perform the moment he arrived at the orphan farm.

  The repair took less time than he had anticipated, and well before it was time for the morning break Mr J.L.B. Matekoni found himself wiping the steering wheel and the driver’s seat to make the car ready for collection by its owner. He was always very careful to ensure that cars were returned to the customer in a clean state—something he had attempted to drill into the apprentices, but without success.

  “How would you feel if your car came back to you with greasy fingerprints all over it?” he said to them. “Would you like it?”

  “I would not see them,” said one of the young men. “I am not worried about fingerprints. As long as a car goes fast, that is the only thing.”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni could barely credit what he had heard. “Do you mean to say that the only thing that advantages is speed? Is that what you really think?”

  The apprentice had looked at him blankly before he gave his reply. “Of course. If a car goes fast, then it is a good car. It has a strong engine. Everybody knows that, Boss.”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni shook his head in despair. How many times had he explained about solid engineering and the merits of a reliable gearbox? How many times had he spelled out to these young men the merits of an economical engine, particularly a good diesel engine that would give years and years of service with very little trouble? Diesel-powered cars did not usually go very fast, but that was not the point; they were good cars anyway. None of these lessons, it appeared, had sunk in. He sighed. “I have been wasting my time,” he muttered. “Wasting my time.”

  The apprentice smiled. “Wasting your time, Boss? What have you been doing? Dancing? You and Mma Ramotswe going dancing at one of those clubs? Hah!”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni wanted to say, “Trying to teach a hyena to dance,” but did not. Where had he heard that expression before? It seemed familiar, and then he remembered he had said it himself only a few days ago when he had been discussing First Class Motors with Mma Ramotswe. The memory made him start, and put the apprentices quite out of his mind. There was something hanging over him; he had forgotten what it was, but now it came back: he still had to deal with the issue of the butcher’s car, which was due to be brought into the garage that morning. The thought appalled him: he would be able to effect a temporary repair, until such time as he tracked down the right parts, but there was more to it than that. He had agreed that he would confront the Manager of First Class Motors and tell him that his wrongdoing had been discovered. He did not relish this, in view of the other man’s reputation. Indeed, it might have been moderately more attractive to do a parachute jump, perhaps, rather than meet the Manager of First Class Motors.

  “You look worried,” said the apprentice. “Is there something troubling you, Boss?”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni sighed. “I have an unpleasant duty to do,” he said. “I have to go and speak to some bad mechanics about their work. That is what is troubling me.”

  “Who are these bad mechanics?” asked the apprentice.

  “Those people at First Class Motors,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “The man who owns it and the men who work for him. They are all bad, every one of them.”

  The apprentice whistled. “Yes, they are bad all right. I have seen those people. They know nothing about cars. They are not like you, Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, who knows everything about all sorts of cars.”

  The compliment from the apprentice was unexpected, and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, in spite of his modesty, was touched by the young man’s tribute.

  “I am not a great mechanic,” he said softly. “I am just careful, that is all, and that is what I have always wanted you to be. I would want you to be careful mechanics. It would make me very happy if you would be that.”

  “We will be,” said the apprentice. “We will try to be like you. We hope that people will always look at our work and think: they learned that from Mr J.L.B. Matekoni.”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni smiled. “Some of your work, maybe …” he began, but the apprentice interrupted him.

  “You see,” he said, “my father is late. He became late when I was a small boy—just that high—very small. And I did not have uncles who were any good, and so I think of you as my father, Rra. That is what I think. You are my father.”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni was silent. He had always had difficulty in expressing his emotions—as mechanics often do, he thought—and it was hard for him now. He wanted to say to this young man: What you have said makes me very proud, and very sad, all at the same time—but he could not find these words. He could, however, place a hand on the young man’s shoulder and leave it there for a moment, to show that he understood what had been said.

  “I have never said thank you, Rra,” went on the apprentice. “And I would not want you to die without being thanked by me.”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni gave a start. “Am I going to die?” he asked. “I am not all that old surely. I am still here.”

  The apprentice smiled. “I did not mean that you were going to die soon, Rra. But you will die one of these days, like everybody else. A
nd I wanted to say thank you before that day came.”

  “Well,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, “what you say is probably true, but we have spent too much time standing here talking about these things. There is work to be done in the garage. We have to get rid of that dirty oil over there. You can take it over to the special dump for burning. You can take the spare truck.”

  “I will do that now,” said the apprentice.

  “And don’t pick up any girls in the truck,” warned Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “You remember what I told you about the insurance.”

  The apprentice, who had been already walking away, suddenly stopped in his tracks, guiltily, and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni knew immediately that this was precisely what he had been planning to do. The young man had made a moving statement, and Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had been touched by what he had said, but some things obviously never changed.

  A few hours later, as the sun climbed up the sky and made shadows short and even the birds were lethargic, when the screeching of the cicadas from the bush behind Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors had reached a high insistent pitch, the butcher drew up in his handsome old Rover. He had had the time to reflect on what Mr J.L.B. Matekoni had told him, and he now spoke angrily of First Class Motors, with whom he intended to have no further dealings. Only shame, the shame of being a victim, prevented him from returning there to ask for his money back.

  “I shall do that for you, Rra,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “I feel responsible for what my brother mechanics have done to you.”

  The butcher took Mr J.L.B. Matekoni’s hand and shook it firmly. “You have been very good to me, Rra. I am glad that there are still some honest men left in Botswana.”

  “There are many honest men in Botswana,” said Mr J.L.B. Matekoni. “I am no better than anybody else.”

  “Oh yes you are,” said the butcher. “I see many men in my work and I can tell …”

  Mr J.L.B. Matekoni cut him short. This was clearly a day for excessive compliments, and he was beginning to feel embarrassed. “You are very kind, Rra, but I must get on with my work. The flies will be settling on the cars if I don’t look out.”