Travelers by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala Page B

Banubai. She has a house in Benares and once I went to live there with her. Oh, she gave me such peace. If only I could have stayed with her. But when I went back to Bombay—” Those had been terrible days. She had meant to lead such a good life, of restraint and devotion, but when temptation came her way she had flung herself into it head over heels. And yet the temptations had been by no means irresistible—just the usual pleasures that she was really quite sick and tired of. She had had an affair with a film producer whom she didn’t care for all that much; he had even disgusted her but she didn’t have the strength to give him up and in the end it was he who had thrown her over in favor of a fat little starlet.
    â€œWe’ll go,” Gopi said, trying to cheer her up. “You see whatLee has written—where is it?—‘and I think you will be happy here too—’”
    Asha snatched the letter from his hand and tore it up. “Why does she write to me like that? She’s mad—a mad girl, I always knew it.”
    In the Ashram
    The ashram was not actually in Benares but about ten miles outside it. This was deliberate policy on Swamiji’s part: he did not wish to batten on the holiness of the past but to inspire new souls with a new spirit. It was also convenient that land was going cheap in that area. It had at one time been earmarked for new industrial development but, apart from a brick kiln and a few foundations that now remained as holes in the ground where snakes lived, no development had taken place. Here Swamiji had acquired an acre of land and had put up some hutments for himself and his followers. Of course the hutments were only temporary and great schemes already existed in blueprint for the future development of the ashram.
    The surrounding landscape was flat, bleak, and dusty. The hutments were strictly utilitarian, with tin roofs stuck on brick walls that heated up like ovens in the sun. Swamiji put his faith in the trees that had been planted all around, but of course it would take time for them to grow and meanwhile they were not doing too well on account of lack of water and also some blight that tended to attack vegetation in the region. There were many flies and mosquitoes, the kitchen arrangements were inadequate, and the sanitary ones primitive. But all these physical discomforts could be and were interpreted as blessings, for what surer test could there be of a disciple’s sincerity than the ability to overcome discomforts? There were many who fell short and one by one they went away, and Swamiji saw them do so with a smiling, loving acquiescence. It only made him draw those that remained closer to himself.
    They were a mixed lot of Westerners and Indians, but he encouraged them to think of themselves as one family and quite often they managed to do so. It was easiest when they were all grouped around Swamiji and he was giving them one of his beautiful discourses or leading them in singing devotional songs. One of the hutments had been fitted up as a communal prayer hall and here they gathered morning and evening for their devotions. Although this hutment was as utilitarian and cheaply furnished as all the others, it had been decorated by loving hands and a beautiful atmosphere prevailed. The room was dominated by a large, colored picture of Swamiji’s own guru, a very holy man who wore no clothes and sat on a deer skin. Underneath this there was a big velvet armchair with an antimacassar embroidered by one of the disciples and here Swamiji sat with two devotees waving a peacock fan over him. They all faced the picture of the holy guru and Swamiji sitting beneath it, and then how they sang! With what inspiration! Of course it was he who inspired them to call after him—“Rama!” he sang, “Gopala! Hari! Krishna!” in his melodious, smiling voice, and then who could resist following him and also calling out those sweet