In the Company of Cheerful Ladies by Alexander McCall Smith Read Free Book Online

relatives. Of course they were the first people who should be approached, but who were they? The lawyers had been unable to provide names, and this would mean that Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi would have to make enquiries amongst Zambians in Gaborone. That sounded simple enough, but it was not always easy to get foreigners to talk about their fellow citizens, especially if one of them was in trouble. They knew that it was wrong to close ranks, especially when it was a question of embezzled funds, but they did it nonetheless. So there were many telephone calls to be made to see if anybody was prepared to throw light on the case. There were also letters to hotels, asking them if they recognised the person in the photograph which they now sent them. All of this was time-consuming, and they worked solidly until ten o’clock, when Mma Ramotswe, having just finished an unsatisfactory telephone call to a rather rude Zambian woman, put down the receiver, stretched her arms wide, and announced that it was time for morning tea.
    Mma Makutsi agreed. “I have written letters now to ten hotels,” she said, taking a sheet out of her typewriter, “and my head is sore from thinking about missing Zambians. I am looking forward to a cup of tea.”
    “I will make it,” offered Mma Ramotswe. “You have been working very hard, while I have just been talking on the telephone.
    You deserve a rest.”
    Mma Makutsi looked embarrassed. “That is very kind, Mma. But I was thinking of making tea in a different way this morning.”
    Mma Ramotswe looked at her assistant in astonishment. “In a different way? How can you make bush tea in a different way?
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    Surely there is only one way to make tea—you put the tea leaves in the tea-pot and then you put in the water. What are you going to do? Put the water in first? Is that the different way you have in mind?”
    Mma Makutsi rose to her feet, picking up the parcel which she had placed on her desk when she arrived. Mma Ramotswe had not noticed this, as it had been behind a pile of files. Now she looked at it with curiosity.
    “What is that, Mma?” Mma Ramotswe asked. “Is it something
    to do with this new way of making tea?”
    Mma Makutsi did not reply, but unwrapped the parcel and exposed a new china tea-pot, which she held up to Mma Ramotswe’s gaze.
    “Ah!” exclaimed Mma Ramotswe. “That is a very fine tea-pot, Mma! Look at it! Look at the flowers on the side. That is very fine. Our bush tea will taste very good if it is brewed in so handsome
    a tea-pot!”
    Mma Makutsi looked down at her shoes, but there was no help from that quarter; there never was. In tight moments, she had noticed, her shoes tended to say: You’re on your own, Boss! She had known all along that this would be awkward, but she had decided that sooner or later she would have to take this issue up with Mma Ramotswe and it could not be put off any longer.
    “Well, Mma,” she began. “Well …”
    She paused. It was going to be more difficult than she had imagined. She looked at Mma Ramotswe, who stared back at her expectantly.
    “I am looking forward to the tea,” said Mma Ramotswe helpfully.
    Mma Makutsi swallowed. “I will not be making bush tea,” she blurted out. “I mean, I will make bush tea for you, as usual, but I want to make my own tea, ordinary tea, in this pot. Just for
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    me. Ordinary tea. You can drink bush tea and I will drink ordinary
    tea.”
    After she had finished speaking, there was a complete silence. Mma Ramotswe sat quite still in her chair, her eyes fixed on the china tea-pot. Mma Makutsi, who had been holding the pot up as if it were a battle standard, a standard for the ranks of those who preferred ordinary tea to bush tea, now lowered it and put it down on her desk.
    “I’m sorry, Mma,” said Mma Makutsi. “I’m very sorry. I do not want you to think that I am a rude person. I am not. But I have tried and tried to like bush tea and now I must speak what is in my heart. And my heart says that I have preferred