Free The Limpopo Academy of Private Detection: No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (13) by Alexander McCall Smith

frowned. “Yes, Rra? You want something?”
    The man nodded. “I need to buy a car, Rra. I need to buy a car for my wife. I saw your sign.”
    Chobie, who had been tense at the beginning of this encounter, now visibly relaxed. “Well, you’re in the right place, my friend. But unfortunately I’m a bit low on stock now—we only have that big car over there. But have you got a mobile? You give me the number and I’ll fix you up with something good. No rubbish—something good. And my mechanic here …,” he gestured to Fanwell, “my mechanic is top-class. He’ll make sure that it’s in A1 order when you get it. You won’t see your wife for dust.
Bang, bang
. She’ll overtake all the other women.
Bang, bang
.”
    The man laughed. “My wife would like that,” he said. “So, here’s my number. You’ll call me?”
    “Of course I will,” said Chobie. “Give me four, maybe five days and I’ll call. And I’ll get my mechanic …”
    The man turned to Fanwell and greeted him formally. “And your name, Rra?”
    Fanwell gave the man his name.
    “He trained at Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors,” boasted Chobie.
    “They have top-rate mechanics out there. Do all the big cars.”
    The man nodded. “I know the place,” he said.

CHAPTER SIX
     

THE THINGS OF WHICH A MECHANIC MIGHT SPEAK
     
    M R. J.L.B. MATEKONI had been in Lobatse and was late home. By the time he arrived, Mma Ramotswe had fed the children and was chatting with Motholeli in her room. The young girl had been in an argument with another girl in school and had been on the verge of tears over dinner. Now it was all coming out and the story, punctuated by copious weeping, was being pieced together by Mma Ramotswe.
This is what I do
, she thought.
During the day I sort out the problems of adults; at night I sort out the problems of children
.
    Mma Ramotswe dabbed at Motholeli’s tears. “Oh, my darling,” she said, “you mustn’t cry. Who is this girl, anyway? How can I help you if I don’t know her name?”
    “She’s a girl in my class,” said Motholeli. “She’s called Kagiso.”
    “There are many Kagisos,” said Mma Ramotswe. “What is her other name?”
    “It is Nnunu. Kagiso Nnunu. She’s horrid and I hate her. I hate her more than snakes.”
    Mma Ramotswe put an arm around Motholeli’s shoulder. It isso small, she thought, and fragile, as if too great a hug might break it:
the shoulder of a small person
. And there was the illness, too; the illness that confined her to the wheelchair took its toll elsewhere—made it difficult for the body to grow at the rate that it should.
    “It doesn’t help to hate somebody,” she said quietly. “I understand why you want to, but it doesn’t help. Not really.”
    Motholeli looked at her incredulously. “But it does, Mma. If you hate somebody hard enough, then they can die.”
    Mma Ramotswe caught her breath. Where had the child learned that? Was that the sort of thing that was being peddled around the playground?
    “Who said that?” she asked. “Did somebody tell you that?”
    Motholeli’s answer came quickly. “The teacher told us. She said that if you hate somebody hard enough then they can die. She said that it can happen.”
    Mma Ramotswe shook her head. “But, Motholeli, that is just not true. That is not true. And …” She was about to say that no teacher would express such a thought, but then she stopped herself. Teachers seemed a different breed these days, more like everybody else; when she had been a pupil at the government school in Mochudi, the teacher had been a figure of authority in the village. People respected teachers and listened to what they had to say. She remembered walking with her late father on the road to Pilane when a cart had gone past, a donkey cart, and there had been a man sitting on the back holding a case of some sort and her father had raised his hat as the man passed. She had asked why he had done this, and he had replied that the man was a