The Good Impression Printing Company occupied half of a largish building in the industrial site that lay beyond the diamond-sorting building. It was not a very impressive building—one of those structures that look like cheap warehouses and which have few windows. Above their door was a sign saying Words mean business. Business means money. Make a good impression with the Good Impression Printing Company! And below that was a picture of a glossy brochure out of which, as from a cornucopia, banknotes cascaded. It was a powerful message, thought Mma Makutsi, and it made her think that perhaps it was time to speak to Mma Ramotswe about a new sign for the agency. That might also have an illustration of some sort to brighten the signboard, but what might it be? A tea-pot was the image that most immediately sprang to mind, but that would hardly do: there was no particular association in the public mind between private detection and tea, even if tea-drinking was an important part of their day’s activities. Mma Ramotswe drank six cups a day—at the office; she had no idea how much bush tea was consumed at home—and she herself drank four, or perhaps five, if one counted the occasional top-up. But this was no time to think about such things, she decided; this was a delicate enquiry, conducted under cover, and she would have to think herself into the part she was about to play—a client inspecting a potential supplier.
Mma Makutsi entered a reception area at the front of the building. It was not a large room and the receptionist’s desk dominated the available space, leaving only a cramped corner for a few chairs. Beside these chairs was a small table on which paper samples and some trade magazines had been stacked.
There was a curious smell in the air, an almost acrid smell that took her a moment to recognise as the smell of ink. That took her back to the school in Bobonong, where they had a room with a duplicating machine and supplies of the ink that it used. It was an old machine of the sort that nobody used any more, and it had been forgotten by the authorities, but the school kept it going. The children had helped with the task of duplication, and she had watched in wonder as the newly printed pages emerged from beneath the circulating drum. And now, a world away from that place and those days, she remembered the smell of ink.
She gave her name to the receptionist, who telephoned and called through to Teenie Magama. Then she sat down on one of the chairs in the corner and waited until Teenie arrived.
She looked at the receptionist, a middle-aged woman wearing what looked like a housecoat but which she decided was actually a loose-fitting dress. Her outfit was far from smart, and Mma Makutsi found herself thinking, It’s not her. This woman has no spare cash. If she were stealing, then one would expect…Or would one? Desperation drove people to theft, did it not? She looked at her more closely.
She decided on a general question. If you could think of nothing to say to somebody, you could always ask them how long they had been doing whatever it was that they were doing. People always seemed willing to talk about that. “Have you worked here very long, Mma?” Mma Makutsi asked.
The receptionist, who had been typing, looked up from her keyboard.
“I do not belong to this place,” she said. “I am here because my daughter is sick. She is the one who has this job. I am standing in for her.” She paused. “And I do not know what I am doing, Mma. I am just sitting here, but I do not know what I am doing.”
Mma Makutsi laughed, but the woman shook her head. “No, I am serious, Mma. I really don’t know what I’m doing. I try to answer the phone, but I end up cutting people off. And I do not know the names of any of the people in the works back there. Except for Mma Magama herself. That Teenie person. I know her name.”
“There are many people who do not know what they are doing,” said Mma Makutsi. “It is not unusual. In fact, maybe even most people do not know. They pretend to know, but they do not really know.”
The receptionist smiled. “Then I am not alone, Mma.”
Mma Makutsi tried another tack. “Is your daughter happy here?” she asked.
The woman’s answer came quickly. “Very happy. She is very happy, Mma. She is always telling other people what a good boss she has. Not everybody can say that.”
Mma Makutsi was about to say that she could, but stopped herself in time. She could not tell this woman about Mma Ramotswe because that would give away what she did and she was meant to be a prospective client, not a private detective. So she said nothing, and they drifted back into silence.
A few minutes later, Teenie appeared through a door behind the receptionist’s desk. She was more plainly dressed than she had been when she had come to Mma Makutsi’s office, and for a moment Mma Makutsi did not recognise her.
“Yes,” said Teenie. “I am not looking smart now. These are my working clothes. And look, see what my hands look like. Ink!”
Mma Makutsi rose to her feet and examined Teenie’s outstretched hands. “If I were a detective,” she said as she saw the large ink stains, like continents, on Teenie’s upturned palms, “I would say that you are a printer.” Then she added hurriedly, glancing down at the receptionist as she spoke, “But I am not a detective, of course!”
“No, of course not,” said Teenie. “You are not a detective, Mma.”
The receptionist, who had been following the conversation between the two of them, looked up sharply. “You are a policewoman, Mma?”
Mma Makutsi noticed the concern in the woman’s voice. “I am nothing to do with the police,” she said. “Nothing at all. I am a businesswoman.”
The receptionist relaxed visibly. Her sharp reaction, thought Mma Makutsi, was unusual. She clearly had something to hide, but it was probably nothing to do with her daughter or the job at the printing works. Unless, of course, she knew that her daughter had been stealing from the works. Mothers and daughters can be close; they tell each other things, and the knowledge that one’s daughter was a thief would obviously make one dread the arrival of the police. But then she reminded herself that there were plenty of people who were afraid of the police, even if they had clear consciences. These were people who had been the victims of bullying when young—bullying by severe teachers, by stronger children; there were so many ways in which people could be crushed. Such people might fear the police in the same way in which they feared all authority.
Mma Makutsi smiled at the receptionist and followed Teenie through the door into the works. The other woman was so small that even though Mma Makutsi was herself only of average height, she found herself looking down at the top of Teenie’s head; at a small woollen bobble, in fact, which topped a curious tea-cosy style knitted cap which she was wearing. She looked more closely at it, wondering if she could make out an opening through which a tea-pot spout might project; she could not see an opening, but there was a very similar tea-cosy in the office, she remembered, and perhaps she or Mma Ramotswe might wear it on really cold days. She imagined how Mma Ramotswe would look in a tea-cosy and decided that she would probably look rather good; it might add to her authority, perhaps, in some indefinable way.