Read The Woman Who Walked in Sunshine for Free Online

useful at the other end of their journey; or that they were actually driving to their work as doctors or accountants or even the pilots of Air Botswana planes; or that they were in the middle of ferrying children about; or that they were going to shops to buy the supplies that they would subsequently cook for their men who
never
bothered to help in the kitchen. She could point all that out and then remind Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni that it might only be men who formed the view that these people were driving around aimlessly because they—the men in question—had no idea what women really did, but she said none of that because she knew that Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni was not one of those men who belittled women and that his remark had not been intended unkindly, and that, when all was said and done, it was probably just a little bit true: there were at least
some
women in Gaborone who had nothing to do but to drive around in that way. So she left all of this unsaid and went on, instead, to say, “I will not drive around like that, Rra—you know that, surely.”
    He was quick to agree. “Of course not, Mma. You will have many things to do, I think. You’ll…”
    The unfinished sentence hung heavily in the air, and Mma Ramotswe thought:
I cannot let it be like that.
She would never be one of those ladies of leisure with their driving round aimlessly until it was time for lunch with other ladies of leisure. No, she would do something with this holiday; she would…She faltered. It was difficult to think what she could possibly do. It was too hot to do any work in the garden, other than in the first half hour or so of light before the sun floated up above the line of acacia trees that made the horizon. Once that happened it would be too late; the very earth that one worked would become too hot to touch, and the only place to be, if one were outside, would be in the pool of shade cast by a tree.
    Of course she could always go for morning tea at the President Hotel. She could sit out on the verandah, which was blissfully shaded, and watch people in the square down below, but there was a limit to how much time you could sit there, eking the last drop out of the teapot, before the waiters began to fuss about you and encourage you to give up your table to somebody else.
    Apart from that, what was there to do? Her friends would all be busy, as they had things to do during the day—jobs to go to or children to look after—and of course none of them would be on holiday. But an idea came to her nonetheless, and now it struck her as being exactly the sort of thing one should do if one found oneself on holiday.
    “I shall go to see Mma Potokwane,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I have not been out to see her for some time, and I think I should.”
    A slightly doubtful expression crossed Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s face. “A visit to Mma Potokwane? Well, perhaps…but don’t you think that might not be the most restful thing to do, Mma? Whenever I go out there I am given something to do—fix the pump, please; make the windscreen wipers on the minibus work again, if you don’t mind; could you look at a light switch in one of the houses, now that you’re here, as it’s sending out sparks when you turn it on, and I am worried about sparks when there are children about, Rra, as I’m sure you’ll understand…That sort of thing, Mma.”
    Mma Ramotswe smiled. “That is because she knows you can do all those things, Rra. It is different when I go out there. Then she likes to eat fruit cake and talk. That is a good way of passing the time if you’re on holiday—eating fruit cake and talking.”
    “That is all right, then,” he conceded. “But remember, Mma, holidays are for doing even less than that. They are also a good time not to eat fruit cake and not to talk.”
    “I shall try to remember that,” said Mma Ramotswe. And then a thought occurred to her. “Of course, they are also a good time not to have to do work in the kitchen.”
    He began to