To the Land of Long Lost Friends by Alexander McCall Smith

Author:Alexander McCall Smith
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2019-10-21T16:00:00+00:00

* * *

—

MMA RAMOTSWE TOLD THEM about her attempt to visit Nametso in the diamond-sorting office. She described the security consultant—“He was a security guard, really, but you know how everybody has become a consultant these days”—and she told them what he had revealed about Nametso. “He said that she now has a Mercedes-Benz, but she parks it elsewhere, not in the parking place she used to have.”

“It’s best to put a car like that in a safe place,” said Charlie. “If you put it in a public parking place, then bang, some lady comes and reverses into you.”

Mma Makutsi glared at him. “Some lady, Charlie? Why do you say some lady? Is it because you think we women can’t drive safely? Is that what you think?”

Charlie made a conciliatory gesture. “I only said ‘some lady’ because I do not want to use sexist language, Mma Makutsi. If I said ‘some man,’ then you would come and say to me, ‘Why are you always talking about men, what about ladies?’ And so I say ‘some lady’ and you jump up and down and say, ‘Why are you picking on ladies?’ ”

“You’re not fooling me, Charlie,” snorted Mma Makutsi. “You said ‘some lady’ because you think it is always ladies who are bumping into other cars in car parks. That is what you think.”

Mma Ramotswe was staring at the ceiling. Over the last twelve months, she had bumped her van into two other cars, both of them in parking places. She had done no real damage, and the owners of the two cars in question had been understanding. One of them was a woman, and she had said to Mma Ramotswe, “Don’t you worry, Mma. I’m always bumping into other cars myself.” It was best, perhaps, not to mention that now, she thought.

And Mma Makutsi was thinking of how Phuti had come back from the Double Comfort Furniture Store one day recently and told her that his secretary had come into the office in tears because she had bumped into a furniture van in the off-loading bay at the back of the building. “He should not have been there, Rra,” she said. “He normally comes at eleven in the morning. This was at nine. What was he doing there? It’s his fault, Rra.”

And yet Mma Ramotswe had read that women were safer drivers than men, and these stories were both unfair and inaccurate. It was young men who caused many of the accidents—young men like Charlie, who only wanted to go fast and show off to people in the back seat. They were the bad drivers, not women. That was well known. Indeed, it was probably the sort of thing that Seretse Khama himself might have said.

“It doesn’t really make much difference,” said Mma Ramotswe. “It seems to me that it is a reasonable explanation to say that she does not want her Mercedes-Benz to be damaged. But—and it’s a big but, I think—the real question is this: Where does a young woman like that get a Mercedes-Benz?”

Mma Makutsi looked thoughtful.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.