The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon (16 page)

The man answered in a clear, confident voice. ‘Yesterday, Mma. I vacuumed the living room and the dining room, too. I would have done more if I had not been so tired.’

Keitumeste nodded. ‘And what sort of vacuum cleaner is it, Rra?’

The question, so innocently put, found its target. The man opened his mouth to speak, and then closed it.

‘You don’t know, do you?’ said Keitumeste scornfully. ‘I can tell you then. Perhaps it was a
Nothing Vacuum Cleaner
. That is a very popular make of vacuum cleaner with men, because it does not exist – that is why!’

Again she looked over the heads of the front two rows to focus on Mr J. L. B. Matekoni. ‘You have never vacuumed, have you, Rra?’

Conscious of the eyes of the class upon him, he muttered a response that did not consist of any words – just a few self-deprecatory sounds.

‘Once again, I must commend you, Rra,’ said Keitumeste. ‘A truly modern husband does not make up information to please people.’ She paused. ‘And here is another question: hands up those who have given their wife a present this month?’

Now no hands went up. Mr J. L. B. Matekoni looked around; honesty, it seemed, was beginning to prevail. And then he remembered: two weeks ago he had bought Mma Ramotswe a new plant for her garden. It was not a plant that she had asked for – it was a completely out-of-the-blue present.

Very slowly he raised his hand.

‘Ah!’ exclaimed Keitumeste. ‘What was this present, Rra?’

‘It was a plant,’ mumbled Mr J. L. B. Matekoni. ‘She is a very keen gardener and she likes to get plants.’

Keitumeste smiled broadly. ‘You see!’ she exclaimed. ‘You see what a truly modern, sympathetic husband does? He gives his wife a present of something that he knows
she
wants. He does not choose something that
he
would like to receive himself; he gets something for
her
.’

Mr J. L. B. Matekoni squirmed in his seat. If he had known that the course would involve this… this humiliation, then he would never have signed up for it. He looked at his watch. Ten minutes had passed. They had another half hour ahead of them. And it was a long half hour – one that moved with all the slowness of time spent in circumstances of social embarrassment.

At the end of it, in spite of Keitumeste’s offer to stay and answer any personal questions that the class might have, he slipped away quickly and returned at a fast pace – almost a run – to his truck. He was not made for courses of that sort, he thought. It might be a good thing to be a more modern husband but there were other ways, he felt, of reaching that desired goal – if indeed Mma Potokwani was right in her view that it was a desirable goal. There had been plenty of men in the past who had not been modern husbands, and their wives had seemed pleased enough with them. Perhaps women like Keitumeste should leave men alone for a while, rather than making them uneasy. And then he thought: what would it be like to be married to somebody like her? How unhappy that poor man must be; how uneasily he must sleep, if he slept at all. That was another thing: modern people always appeared to be rushing about doing things, having no time, it seemed, for looking at the sky, or counting the cattle they had already counted, or waiting for somebody to walk by and pass the time of day with them. They missed so much in all their anxiety and anger, and in their determination to stop other people doing things of which they happened to disapprove. Perhaps he should stay more or less as he was: Mr J. L. B. Matekoni, mechanic, not-very-good cook, but nonetheless devoted husband of Precious Ramotswe, the woman he loved and admired above all others and for whom he would do anything – anything at all – in his own not-very-modern way.

While Mr J. L. B. Matekoni was attending his first class on how to be a modern husband, Mma Ramotswe was on her way to visit Mma Makutsi. She had telephoned her assistant to arrange the visit and had been surprised that the telephone had been answered by Mma Makutsi herself, rather than by Phuti’s aunt. Had the aunt answered, she had no doubt at all that reasons would have been given for the visit not to take place, but Mma Makutsi, by contrast, was keen that she should come.

‘My baby is making a lot of progress,’ she said. ‘He’s taken very great strides, Mma.’

‘He’s not walking already, Mma?’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘Surely it is a bit early for that.’

Mma Makutsi laughed. ‘No, I do not mean that, Mma. He will walk in good time, but not yet.’

Mma Ramotswe continued the joke. ‘I thought that perhaps up in Bobonong babies walked earlier than down here. I thought maybe they walked back from the hospital with their mother – holding her hand, of course.’

A shriek of laughter came down the line. ‘Mma Ramotswe! You are very funny. You are making my stomach hurt with laughter.’

A time was agreed, and now Mma Ramotswe had closed the Radiphuti gate behind her and was driving her tiny white van cautiously up the rough driveway to the house. The painters who had been working on the outside had made great strides too and had almost finished with the guttering, which was being painted purple. That, thought Mma Ramotswe, was a Makutsi touch, as she had always had a liking for purple shoes. It was something to do with Bobonong, perhaps, where there were whole fields of those strange rocks which, when broken open, revealed purple crystals. Mma Makutsi had brought one into the office to use as a paperweight, and it caught the light sometimes, sending dancing specks of light on to the walls, as if a colourful hand had touched them and left its purple fingerprints.

Mma Ramotswe had hoped that Phuti’s aunt would not be in, but it was she who opened the front door.

‘It is you,’ said the aunt abruptly. ‘Yes?’

Mma Ramotswe made an effort to control herself. The rudeness of this woman was almost beyond belief. ‘Yes, it is me, Mma. I’m sorry, but it’s me.’

‘And?’ snapped the aunt.

‘I am here to see Mma Makutsi.’

‘Mma Radiphuti,’ shot back the aunt. ‘What is this nonsense about keeping names. She is a Radiphuti now.’

Mma Ramotswe took a deep breath. ‘And a Makutsi. I am a Ramotswe and a Matekoni. We can use both names, Mma, if that is what we want to do.’

The aunt wrinkled her nose. ‘She is very tired. You should come back some other time.’

Mma Ramotswe ignored this. ‘Thank you, Mma. You are very kind, but I can show myself in. Thank you very much.’

As on her previous visit, she pushed past the aunt and started to make her way into the house when Mma Makutsi appeared. ‘You can get on with your rest now, Auntie,’ she said respectfully. ‘We shall go to the kitchen.’

The aunt sniffed and retreated, leaving the two women by themselves.

‘Your house is looking so good,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘It’s many years since we painted Zebra Drive. Mr J. L. B. Matekoni has been promising to do it for a long time, but he has not started yet.’

‘He is very busy, Mma. You will need to get our painter. He works very quickly and very well.’

Mma Ramotswe thought of their last painter. ‘They are always going off to funerals, Mma. Don’t you find that?’

Mma Makutsi smiled. ‘He was off this week, but he came back.’

‘I think that it is not really funerals they are going to,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘They go off to paint other houses. They have more than one job at a time.’

‘Like us,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘We do that. We have more than one case going at any time, do we not?’

It was true, and it reminded Mma Ramotswe of the reason for her visit. ‘I need to talk to you, Mma,’ she said. ‘We have some very difficult cases at the moment.’

They went into the kitchen. The baby, Mma Makutsi explained, was sleeping but he would wake up before long and make his presence known. ‘He has a very loud voice,’ she said. ‘And he sounds just like Phuti.’

Mma Ramotswe was puzzled by this remark, but said nothing. How could a baby sound like his father? Babies said nothing, they cried, and Phuti… The awful thought occurred to her: did the baby have a stammer, as Phuti had? Could one stutter as one cried? It was an absurd idea, and she stopped herself from thinking it, as she had stopped herself envisaging the baby making great strides around the nursery…

Mma Makutsi made tea. Mma Ramotswe saw that she had a special supply of redbush tea specially for her, and was touched; that one woman should keep something in the house for the visit of another woman was a nice example of what friendship might be.

‘Now, Mma,’ said Mma Makutsi as she sipped at her own cup of Tanganda Tea. ‘What is all this?’

Mma Ramotswe began with the Molapo case. Mma Makutsi had been there for the visit of Mma Sheba, of course, but Mma Ramotswe brought her up to date with what had happened since, including the visit to the farm and the encounter with Liso.

‘I didn’t like the look of him to begin with,’ she said. ‘He was wearing one of those ridiculous hats that young men wear. I know it means nothing, but it put me against him.’

‘It is a sign,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘A hat can be a sign.’

‘Yes, but you have to be careful. Remember what Clovis Andersen says in the book? Remember how he says that the shirt a man wears is not always the shirt he would like to wear?’

Mma Makutsi remembered that. ‘Have you heard from him?’ she asked.

‘From?’

‘From Mr Andersen? I thought that perhaps he might have written again.’

‘No, he has not, Mma. He has many important things to do.’

There had been one letter since Clovis Andersen had returned to Muncie, Indiana. It had arrived shortly after his trip to Botswana had come to an end and it had been read and reread by both Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi before being filed away in a file specially devoted to it.

Now Mma Makutsi mused, ‘I might write to him and tell him about my baby.’

In Mma Ramotswe’s view this was a good idea. ‘He would be very interested, Mma.’

‘Especially in the name,’ said Mma Makutsi.

Mma Ramotswe looked up. ‘You have chosen it now?’

Mma Makutsi nodded. ‘Phuti and I have agreed.’

Mma Ramotswe took a sip of her tea, glancing at Mma Makutsi over the rim of her cup. ‘And, Mma?’

‘Itumelang,’ said Mma Makutsi.

It was a reasonably common name in a country where names were highly individual and there were many thousands from which to choose.

‘It is a good name,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘Itumelang Radiphuti sounds very good to my ear, Mma.’ She paused. ‘Have there been many Itumelangs in Phuti’s family?’

‘His father’s brother,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘But that is not the reason we have chosen it. We like the name for its own sake.’

‘Of course.’

‘But he has other names too,’ said Mma Makutsi. ‘His full name will be Itumelang Clovis Radiphuti.’

Mma Ramotswe clapped her hands in pleasure. ‘That is wonderful, Mma! That is a very good name. Phuti told me you might do that.’

Mma Makutsi smiled demurely. ‘I am glad that you like it, Mma. It is a tribute to Clovis Andersen.’

‘Of course it is. Of course it is. And Rra Andersen will be very pleased when he hears it, I think. You must write to him. Send him a photograph and tell him that this baby has been given his name. People like that.’

‘I will do that, Mma.’

They reverted to the subject of Liso. ‘I was not sure of him at first, Mma,’ continued Mma Ramotswe, ‘but then I ended up liking him. You know how that can happen – you start off being wary of somebody and then you realise that your suspicions are wrong.’

Mma Makutsi had experienced that, but it was possible, she pointed out, that exactly the opposite might happen. ‘You may meet people who you think are all right and then you realise that they are not. That happens too, Mma.’

Mma Ramotswe moved on to describe the anxiety that Liso’s aunt had felt about leaving him alone with her. ‘And every time I asked him a question, she answered. It was as if she was worried that he would say something that would give him away.’

Mma Makutsi looked thoughtful. ‘Sometimes people are like that,’ she said. ‘They feel anxious about what their relatives will say. I have an aunt in Bobonong who replies for her husband all the time. Now he never opens his mouth at all when anybody speaks to him – he just looks at her and she tells that other person what he is thinking.’

‘Yes,’ said Mma Ramotswe. ‘That can happen. But there is something more, Mma.’

‘Yes?’

Mma Ramotswe lifted her teacup and tilted it to make sure that she got the last few drops. Mma Makutsi saw this; it was a signal that they had both used many times and was picked up immediately.

‘I shall get you more tea,’ she said. ‘Then you can tell me.’

Their cups refreshed, Mma Makutsi listened while Mma Ramotswe related what Gwithie had told her about Liso calling his aunt his mother. Mma Makutsi weighed this for some time before she gave her response.

‘There is something that Clovis Andersen says,’ she began. ‘He says that you should always ask who has an interest in something. Remember that, Mma? Remember how he said: find out who has a stake?’

She did remember.

‘So, Mma,’ continued Mma Makutsi, ‘you must ask yourself: who has a stake in all this?’