How to Raise an Elephant

by Alexander McCall Smith

  Charlie had recently married, and was living in a rented flat near the village, courtesy of his new father-in-law.

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni looked at Fanwell. “I think I’m going to go and have a word with him. You come too, Fanwell.”

  Fanwell looked uncomfortable. If Charlie was going to be berated—which looked likely—he was not sure that he wanted to be party to that. Charlie asked for this sort of thing to happen, but he and Fanwell had been through a lot together over the years, and there was an old bond between them.

  “But there are things to do here,” he began. And then, rather lamely, “Work and…” He trailed off.

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s expression suggested the subject was closed: Fanwell would be accompanying him. He was a mild man, not given to strong views or displays of anger, but the young mechanic could tell that his boss was rattled.

  “I’ll come, Boss,” Fanwell said quickly, wiping his hands on a twist of the blue absorbent paper dispensed from a large roll on the wall. He looked down at the ground: he had warned Charlie that he would take matters too far one day—he had told him. Whatever could have possessed him to think that he could damage Mma Ramotswe’s van, fail to mention what had happened, and then get away with it? As a very young man—an eighteen-year-old—Charlie had been able to get away with virtually anything through sheer charm. People forgave him because of his jaunty good looks and his winning smile. Those seemed to work with everybody—they were particularly effective with women; but men, too, seemed susceptible to them. It was a different effect with them, thought Fanwell: men saw in Charlie the boy they once were—or would have liked to be. Older women saw him as a wayward son—they wanted to mother him—while to young women he was seditiously attractive: a bad boy who wasn’t quite as bad as all that, who would calm down once a wedding ring was placed on his finger and he was staked off as occupied territory.

  Fanwell was not a risk-taker. When attending to car engines, he tested nuts before he attempted to take them off the bolt; Charlie would use brute force, not caring about stripping the thread. When connecting a wire to a terminal, Fanwell would use a carefully positioned drop of solder, just to be sure, whereas Charlie would simply make a loop with the end of the wire and wind it round the screw. The difference was stability and permanence; Charlie’s mechanical interventions might fix a problem, but they would do that only for a short while. Sooner or later the patch would be shaken off by the vibrations that pass through any car in motion, and the problem for which help had been sought would recur. “People don’t like bringing their cars back to the garage,” Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni explained. “Mechanics are like dentists: people don’t want to see them too often.”

  Charlie had raised a finger to make a point. “Me,” he said, “I’ve never been to the dentist. Not once. Ever.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni had ignored this, but Fanwell had expressed surprise. “Never? Never ever, Charlie? You mean you’ve never gone, even if he didn’t do anything to your teeth?”

  Charlie had struck a nonchalant pose. “Never. That’s what I said. Why go to the dentist unless your teeth are sore. Mine aren’t.” He opened his mouth and tapped his front teeth. “These teeth—see them—they’re never sore. Never. And all the teeth behind them are in first-class condition A1. I don’t need a dentist to tell me that.”

  Fanwell shook his head. “Everyone needs to go to the dentist, Charlie. They told us that at school. Remember that science teacher who gave lessons on personal hygiene? Remember him? What did he say, Charlie? What did he say?”

  Charlie shrugged. “He was always saying things. That’s the trouble with teachers—they spend a lot of their time saying things. If they said fewer things—hardly anything—then people would listen to them. But they don’t.”

  Fanwell looked to Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni for support, which was forthcoming. “Fanwell is right. Things can be going on inside your teeth, Charlie. Outside, they can look fine, but once you get inside they can be full of rot.” Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni paused. “You should see a dentist, Charlie. I will pay for you to have a check-up.”

  Charlie was unconvinced. “That’s good of you, Boss. But I don’t want to waste your money. If I went to a dentist, he’d take one look and then say, ‘First-class teeth—nothing needed there.’ But we’d still have to pay, you see, and I don’t want to waste your money, Boss.”

  “But it’s not just about teeth,” Fanwell persisted. “There’s something called gum disease, Charlie. If your gums get sick, then your teeth drop out. You wake up one morning and you have no teeth. That has happened many times. And if you had no teeth, what would the girls say?”

  “They’d say, ‘No thanks,’ ” offered Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “Girls like a man to have teeth.”

  Charlie laughed. “How do you know that, Boss? I don’t want to be rude, but how do you know what girls want?”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni took the question in a good-natured way. “I might surprise you, Charlie,” he said. “You may not know that I was a big man with the women back in the old days. Oh yes, you can smile at that, but I was. There were always women watching me, waiting for their chance.”

  Even Fanwell was surprised. “You must have been very popular, Rra. What happened?”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni looked hurt. “What happened? Are you saying that…” He made a helpless gesture.

  Fanwell quickly apologised. “I did not mean that, Rra. I did not mean to say that you are not popular still. I think you are. Women are still watching you, Rra. I have seen it.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni was suddenly interested. “Oh, really, Fanwell? Where are these women? I have not seen them, I’m afraid. I’m prepared to accept they are there, but I have not seen them myself.”

  Charlie caught Fanwell’s eye. “You shouldn’t be winding the boss up,” he said. “There are no women, Rra. Or not that we have seen.”

  “There could be,” said Fanwell. “You know what women are like, Charlie. They are always on the lookout for a better man. They look at the man they already have and think: There must be better men than this one. That’s what I believe they think.” He lowered his voice. “I have heard women say that—using those exact words. It is very shocking.” He paused. “Even that Queenie-Queenie of yours. I don’t want to make you feel insecure, Charlie, but how do you know what goes on in her head? How do you know that she isn’t thinking: There must be men who are a bit better than Charlie? That’s what I would be thinking if I were going out with you. That’s what I’d be saying to myself.”

  * * *

  —

  THEY DROVE in Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s truck to the street in the heart of Old Naledi where Charlie’s uncle’s house occupied a corner lot. It was a shabby part of town, one of the cheapest suburbs, ignored by the wave of prosperity that had moved across so many other parts of Gaborone. Many of the houses here were not much more than shacks, even if there were none of the tarpaulin and tin shelters of the real shanty town. Such places had not come into existence in Botswana because the poverty that produced them had been kept at bay, but even so, there were still families who lived in cement-block houses of one room and a make-do kitchen, where people washed in small tin tubs, and where the characteristic odour of penury, that smell of cheap soap and rancid frying oil, of rubbed-in dirt, was never far away. This was nothing like that; indeed, Charlie’s uncle’s house was well appointed by comparison, had a sound roof of red-painted tin, and, being at the end of a street, enjoyed a large plot of scrub land on which structures of any sort were yet to be built. This land boasted a thicket of trees and an unruly hedge of rubber plant with its friable branches and its viscous white sap.

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni parked the truck at the gate and gestured for Fanwell to follow him up the short path that led to the house. Fanwell dragged his feet; he was not relishing this encounter with his friend.

  “Don’t be too hard on him, Boss,” he said a
s they closed the gate behind them.

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni sighed. “I am not like that, Fanwell. I haven’t come to punish him. I’ve come to ask for an explanation.”

  Fanwell nodded. He understood.

  “And if nobody asked Charlie to explain himself,” Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni continued, “if nobody tackled him about a thing like this, then it would be doing him no favours. He has to learn that he can’t do this sort of thing and get away with it.”

  Fanwell nodded again. “I know that, Rra. I know that.”

  They approached the house. The front door, a rickety-looking construction painted green and with a gauze fly-screen across its top half, was held open by a propped-up stick. Inside the house, the legs of a table could be made out, and a burning light bulb. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni called out, and then moved to knock on the door.

  A boy of about ten appeared. His torso was bare, his only garment being a pair of skimpy khaki shorts. He raised his eyes to the visitors, and then lowered them again. A child did not stare at older people; most children had that instilled in them at an early age.

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni greeted the child politely. “We have come to speak to Charlie.”

  The child said nothing, his gaze still fixed on the floor at his feet.

  “You’re Charlie’s cousin, aren’t you?” said Fanwell. “I’ve met you, I think. Have I met you?”

  The boy nodded. “You are my cousin’s friend, Rra. I know you.”

  “So where is Charlie?” asked Fanwell, and added, “We haven’t come to give him trouble, you know. That is not why we are here.”

  The child seemed relieved by the assurance. “He is not in the house. He is outside.”

  Fanwell frowned. “We did not see him. We came in that way.” He gestured behind them.

  “He is not on that side,” said the child. “He is over there—behind the house. But he will not want to see you, I think. I think he will want you to go away.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni smiled. “How do you know that, young fellow? How do you know he will not want to see us? I’m his boss at the garage. Did you know that?”

  The boy cast his eyes down once again. “He told me to tell anybody to go away.”

  Fanwell shook a finger at the boy. “We are not anybody. I am Charlie’s friend from a long way back. Back, back. And this is his boss. We are not just anybody.”

  The boy pointed again. “I can take you. He is just back there.” He paused. “But he told me that nobody was to see what he has there. He told me that, and I am scared because he will be very angry and will hit me.”

  Fanwell tried to reassure the boy. “You can stay here. The boss and I will go and find him. He will not blame you.”

  The boy looked miserable. “He will say I told you about the elephant.”

  This brought sudden silence as Fanwell and Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni exchanged glances.

  “An elephant?” asked Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “What is this elephant?”

  The boy pursed his lips.

  “You must tell us,” said Fanwell. “You cannot say ‘elephant’ and leave it at that. What elephant are you talking about?”

  The boy looked up. “He has an elephant now. Charlie has an elephant.”

  Fanwell laughed. “Charlie has an elephant! Yes, and I have a giraffe. Or maybe a lion. Yes, I have a lion.”

  The boy shook his head vigorously. “No, Rra, I am not talking about any of those animals. I am talking about the elephant that Charlie has out at the back there. Behind the hedge. There is a very small elephant. Very small.”

  Fanwell looked to Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni for guidance. “What do we do, Boss?”

  “We go and take a look,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni.

  Fanwell followed him out of the house and along a path that led to the hedge and the cluster of trees on the wasteland. “There can’t be an elephant,” he said. “That boy is imagining it.”

  “We’ll see,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “I can’t imagine there’s an—”

  He stopped. Through the body of the hedge they could make out the figure of Charlie, bending over a small, humped shape. And then the shape moved, and its ears and its trunk could be made out. There was a baby elephant; it could be nothing else.

  “Charlie!” called out Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni.

  Charlie straightened up. He opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it again. The elephant raised its minute trunk and ran it across Charlie’s forearm gently, tentatively.

  “See,” said Charlie. “See. He thinks I’m his mother.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni and Fanwell said nothing.

  “You see?” Charlie repeated.

  Fanwell shook his head. “You’ve really done it now, Charlie.”

  If Charlie noticed the reproach, he did not show it. He smiled. Addressing Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni with a note of triumph, he said, “You see, Boss? You see how this little elephant likes me?”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni shook his head. He turned to Fanwell. “Did you know about this?” he asked. “Did you know that Charlie had an elephant?”

  Fanwell was indignant. “Of course I didn’t, Boss. Charlie has never done anything like this before.” He paused. “So that was the smell in the van, Rra. That was the reason for the dent in the tailgate.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni sighed. “Did you transport an elephant in Mma Ramotswe’s van, Charlie?”

  Charlie stroked the tiny elephant behind its ears. “Maybe, Boss. Maybe.”

  The elephant turned to face Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni and took a few steps towards him. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni stood stock-still.

  “There,” said Charlie. “He likes you too, Boss. Maybe he thinks you’re his father.” He laughed, and patted the calf on its head. “Me, I’m the mother, and you’re the father, Rra. And this little one…” He gave another pat on the head. “And this little one is our child.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni was silent as the tiny elephant’s trunk explored his shoes and ankles. He turned to Charlie. “What are you going to do with this poor little creature, Charlie?”

  Charlie shrugged. “I don’t know, Boss. But that’s not really my problem. My friend says he’s working something out.”

  “And what will that be?” pressed Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni.

  “Don’t ask me, Boss. I’m just looking after him for a few days.”

  They stayed a few minutes longer, and then, leaving Charlie with the elephant, they made their way back to the front of the house. The young cousin came out to meet them.

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni looked at the boy, who was frowning, as if worried about something. “Are you all right?” he asked.

  The boy stopped in his tracks, staring at the ground. Then he raised his eyes to meet Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s gaze.

  “They’re going to eat that elephant,” he said.

  Nobody moved. At last Fanwell broke the silence. “Who’s going to eat him?”

  The boy’s voice was no more than a whisper. “Not Charlie. It is not Charlie.”

  “Who then?” asked Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, bending down so that he was looking the youngster in the face.

  The boy closed his eyes. “I heard Charlie’s friend talking to his brother on his phone. Charlie was not here. The friend’s brother is a butcher, Rra. He said that he would take the elephant. I heard him talking about money.”

  “And you’re sure Charlie doesn’t know?”

  “He does not know, Rra.”

  Fanwell frowned. “But why have you not warned Charlie?”

  The boy shifted his weight from foot to foot. “Charlie always does what that friend tells him to do. He is a bit scared of him, I think, Rra.” He paused. “And I do not think he would believe me. That friend of his is a liar, and he would say that he was not going to do this thing he was threatening to do, and Charlie would believe him.”

>   Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni laid a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Listen, young man,” he said. “Don’t talk to anybody about this. Do you understand?”

  The boy nodded miserably. “It is a very friendly little elephant,” he said.

  “Yes,” said Fanwell. “It is.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MORNING BOYFRIEND, EVENING BOYFRIEND

  HISTORY RECORDS only a handful of occasions on which Mma Makutsi rose from her desk to her feet in astonishment, exaltation, or outrage. One was when Mma Ramotswe had announced that for the first month in its history the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency had made a profit (astonishment); the occasion when news had come through of the defeat of Violet Sephotho in one of her many machinations (exaltation); and when apprentices had used her teapot for the temporary storage of diesel oil (outrage). And now there was just such a moment, as Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, accompanied by Fanwell, came into the office and cleared his throat in the way in which he always did when about to say something portentous.

  “We have just seen something very…” He struggled to find the right word. At his side, Fanwell ventured, “Very unbelievable.”

  Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni nodded. “Yes, indeed. Very unbelievable—so unbelievable as to be…” Once more he floundered.

  “So unbelievable that we cannot believe it,” suggested Fanwell.

  Mma Makutsi looked up from the letter she was reading. It had come from a woman in Francistown who suspected that her husband was having an affair—a letter of a type that the agency received several times a week from all corners of the country. “There are far too many affairs going on in Botswana,” Mma Ramotswe once said. “You’d think that was number four in the list of national activities: diamond mining, wildlife tourism, cattle…and then, affairs.” Mma Makutsi had smiled, but had doubted whether Botswana was any different from anywhere else. “Those things are happening everywhere, Mma,” she said. “Wherever there are men, then you will find that there are affairs going on.”