Alexander McCall Smith - Tears of the Giraffe

"Well," said the woman, "I can tell you. They have a lot of people like Dr Ranta in them. You'll find out. I can speak to you about this because I'm leaving tomorrow. I'm going to a better job."

Mma Ramotswe was given instructions as to how to find Dr Ranta's office and she took her leave of the helpful receptionist. It was not a good idea on the university's part, she thought, to put that woman in the enquiry office. If she greeted any enquiry as to a member of staff with the gossip on that person, a visitor might get quite the wrong impression. Yet perhaps it was just because she was leaving the next day that she was talking like this; in which case, thought Mma Ramotswe, there was an opportunity.

"One thing, Mma," she said, as she reached the door. "It may be hard for anybody to deal with Dr Ranta because he hasn't done anything wrong. It may not be a good thing to interfere with students, but that may not be grounds for sacking him, at least it may not be these days. So maybe there's nothing that can be done."

She saw immediately that it was going to work, and that her surmise, that the receptionist had suffered at the hands of Dr Ranta, was correct.

"Oh yes, he has," she retorted, becoming suddenly animated. "He showed an examination paper to a student if she would oblige him. Yes! I'm the only one who knows it. The student was my cousin's daughter. She spoke to her mother, but she would not report it. But the mother told me."

"But you have no proof?" said Mma Ramotswe, gently. "Is that the problem?"

"Yes," said the receptionist. "There is no proof. He would lie his way out of it."

"And this girl, this Margaret, what did she do?"

"Margaret? Who is Margaret?"

"Your cousin's daughter," said Mma Ramotswe.

"She is not called Margaret," said the receptionist. "She is called Angel. She did nothing, and he got away with it. Men get away with it, don't they? Every time."

Mma Ramotswe felt like saying No. Not always, but she was short of time, and so she said goodbye for the second time and began to make her way to the Department of Economics.

THE DOOR was open. Mma Ramotswe looked at the small notice before she knocked: Dr Oswald Ranta, BSc (Econ.), (UB) PhD (Duke). If I am not in, you may leave a message with the Departmental Secretary. Students wishing to have essays returned should see their tutor or go to the Departmental Office.

She listened for the sound of voices from within the room and none came. She heard the click of the keys of a keyboard. Dr Ranta was in.

He looked up sharply as she knocked and edged the door open.

"Yes, Mma," he said. "What do you want?"

Mma Ramotswe switched from English to Setswana. "I would like to speak to you, Rra. Have you got a moment?"

He glanced quickly at his watch.

"Yes," he said, not impolitely. "But I haven't got forever. Are you one of my students?"

Mma Ramotswe made a self-deprecating gesture as she sat down on the chair which he had indicated. "No," she said. "I am not that educated. I did my Cambridge Certificate, but nothing after that. I was busy working for my cousin's husband's bus company, you see. I could not go on with my education."

"It is never too late, Mma," he said. "You could study. We have some very old students here. Not that you are very old, of course, but the point is that anybody can study." "Maybe," she said. "Maybe one day."

"You could study just about anything here," he went on. "Except medicine. We can't make doctors just yet." "Or detectives."

He looked surprised. "Detectives? You cannot study detection at a university."

She raised an eyebrow. "But I have read that at American universities there are courses in private detection. I have a book by..."

He cut her short. "Oh that! Yes, at American colleges you can take a course in anything. Swimming, if you like. But that's only at some of them. At the good places, places that we call Ivy League, you can't get away with that sort of nonsense. You have to study real subjects."

"Like logic?"

"Logic? Yes. You would study that for a philosophy degree. They taught logic at Duke, of course. Or they did when I was there."

He expected her to look impressed, and she tried to oblige him with a look of admiration. This, she thought, is a man who needs constant reassurance-hence all the girls.

"But surely that is what detection is all about. Logic, and a bit of psychology. If you know logic, you know how things should work; if you know psychology, you should know how people work."

He smiled, folding his hands across his stomach, as if preparing for a tutorial. As he did so, his gaze was running down Mma Ramotswe's figure, and she sensed it. She looked back at him, at the folded hands, and the sharp dresser's tie.

"So, Mma," he said. "I would like to spend a long time discussing philosophy with you. But I have a meeting soon and I must ask you to tell me what you wanted to talk about. Was it philosophy after all?"

She laughed. "I would not waste your time, Rra. You are a clever man, with many committees in your life. I am just a lady detective. I..."

She saw him tense. The hands unfolded, and moved to the arms of the chair.

"You are a detective?" he asked. The voice was colder now.

She made a self-deprecating gesture. "It is only a small agency. The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. It is over by Kgale Hill. You may have seen it."

"I do not go over there," he said. "I have not heard of you."

"Well, I wouldn't expect you to have heard of me, Rra. I am not well-known, unlike you."

His right hand moved uneasily to the knot of his tie.

"Why do you want to talk to me?" he asked. "Has somebody told you to come and speak to me?"

"No," she said. "It's not that."

She noticed that her answer relaxed him and the arrogance returned.

"Well then?" he said.

"I have come to ask you to talk about something that happened a long time ago. Ten years ago."

He stared at her. His look was guarded now, and she smelt off him that unmistakable, acrid smell of a person experiencing fear.

"Ten years is a long time. People do not remember."

"No," she conceded. "They forget. But there are some things that are not easily forgotten. A mother, for example, will not forget her son."

As she spoke, his demeanour changed again. He got up from his chair, laughing.

"Oh," he said. "I see now. That American woman, the one who is always asking questions, is paying you to go round digging up the past again. Will she never give up? Will she never learn?"

"Learn what?" asked Mma Ramotswe. He was standing at the window, looking out on a group of students on the walkway below.

"Learn that there is nothing to be learned," he said. "That boy is dead. He must have wandered off into the Kalahari and got lost. Gone for a walk and never come back. It's easily done, you know. One thorn tree looks much like another, you know, and there are no hills down there to guide you. You get lost. Especially if you're a white man out of your natural element. What do you expect?"

"But I don't believe that he got lost and died," said Mma Ramotswe. "I believe that something else happened to him." He turned to face her. "Such as?" he snapped.

She shrugged her shoulders. "I am not sure exactly what. But how should I know? I was not there." She paused, before adding, almost under her breath. "You were."

She heard his breathing, as he returned to his chair. Down below, one of the students shouted something out, something about a jacket, and the others laughed. "You say I was there. What do you mean?" She held his gaze. "I mean that you were living there at the time. You were one of the people who saw him every day. You saw him on the day of his death. You must have some idea."

"I told the police at the time, and I have told the Americans who came round asking questions of all of us. I saw him that morning, once, and then again at lunchtime. I told them what we had for lunch. I described the clothes he was wearing. I told them everything."