Sacred Games (109 page)

So we both knew. I had no pretence of being a seer like Guru-ji, of having his spiritual powers or his insight. But I knew. ‘All right, Guru-ji. I remember you said in one of your pravachans that in every meeting there is already the beginning of loss.'

‘Yes. We find each other only to lose each other. Loss is inevitable.'

‘So there is no need to grieve. Perhaps we will find each other again.'

‘Perhaps. But Arjun, even if we are not going to see each other face to face, I don't want to lose you in this life too soon.'

‘Guru-ji?'

‘I see danger for you in the east. I see great danger.'

‘From where, Guru-ji? From whom?'

‘I can't tell. But there is danger to your life. Be very careful.'

‘I will. As always. I'll be even more careful. Even more.'

‘I will watch over you.'

So, we took a walk. There was nothing else to say or do. I lived in danger, I had done it for years now, and now Guru-ji had given me a warning. I would be even more vigilant, if that was possible. Guru-ji liked greenery, he loved flowers and trees, he had spoken of this often in his sermons, about the need to save the environment. In the centre of Munich there was a park, and we went to it, just Guru-ji and I and two of his sadhus. The sadhus walked some distance behind us, out of earshot. Guru-ji and I spoke of ordinary things, about the price of gold, and the increasing number of overweight children in the middle class in India, and the next generation of computers, and the worldwide changes in weather and the implications for the monsoon. After the cosmic conversations that we had had recently, it was a relief to come back to the ground, to this summer day with strolling families, and children who stared at Guru-ji, and leaping dogs. The braver kids came up to Guru-ji, and he talked and laughed with them. Looking at them, I thought of what a perfect shot this was: the rolling grass, the heavy-headed trees moving gently in the breeze, the generous sun, Guru-ji's great bent head, and the slender, pale necks of the children as they clustered about him. Remember this, I told myself, witness this and remember it always.

I tried to see Guru-ji clearly. He was so enlightened, so far advanced that he was somewhat removed from the world of men and women. I knew that he valued cleanliness, that he liked gardens and greenery, that he had vast amounts of knowledge about arcane subjects, that he liked to learn about the latest advances in technology as soon as they happened. But still he hovered a little above the earth, I couldn't know him like I
knew Arvind, or Suhasini, or Bunty. I knew them like I knew myself, I knew the shape of their desires, what they were afraid of, how they thought. I could predict what they would do, and I could make them want certain things, I could direct them and control them. I had them.

But Guru-ji, when I tried to think about him, when I imagined him, he appeared in my thoughts like one of those pictures from calendars of Vivekananda or Paramhansa, vivid and unforgettable but not quite human, more than human. I couldn't quite grasp him, my Guru-ji. Even when he was sweeping along in his wheelchair a few feet in front of me, leaning back so he was only on two wheels, followed by a comet's tail of laughing children. I had asked him once about his family, and he had told me quite openly about his air-force father, who kept the country's fighter planes running and had a drinking problem. And about his mother, who suffered from asthma and wept copiously when his motorcycle accident happened, but who was his main supporter in his quest for spiritual knowledge, and his first devotee. I knew about his tastes in food, that he was vegetarian but not at all fussy, that he would share a poor farmer's meagre lunch and enjoy it with the same gusto as he would a prime minister's fancy tea. I knew all this, and yet I knew that I knew him not at all. He remained hidden behind that steady gaze of his, that taking-in which gave back love and peace and certainty. Maybe I was being presumptuous, I thought as I walked along behind him, to hope that I could understand him as I understood other men. He had left the ego behind, and become something divine. And I was not yet close enough to divinity to comprehend this godliness. To attempt to do so was itself an act of ego, a movement of pride. All I could properly hope for was this moment of darshan, a fleeting connection. But still, I had an urge to try. I stepped up to him, past the children, and said, ‘Guru-ji?'

‘Yes, Arjun.'

‘I have a question. Perhaps it's impertinent.'

‘All the better. Ask it.'

‘Have you ever been in love, Guru-ji?'

‘All the time, Arjun.'

‘Not like that, Guru-ji. I know you love me, and them –' I pointed at the children ‘– but with a person. Ishq, pyaar, muhabbat, Guru-ji. Have you ever been a deewana?'

‘I was very young when this happened,' he said, pointing at his legs.

‘So, never?' I thought I knew the answer already. A man who had realized his own supreme essence loved all creation equally, he would have no
need for this partial, fragmented blindness that was love for another person. If you were Brahman itself, why would you need to become Majnoon? But he surprised me.

‘A deewana? Yes, maybe once. Before the accident. When I was very young.'

‘No, really?'

‘Yes, really. We saw each other every day because we lived in neighbouring houses, and yet the hours apart were torture.' He smiled. ‘Is that what you are talking about, Ganesh?'

‘Yes, Guru-ji,' I said eagerly. ‘And when you saw her, you were afraid of each minute because it was passing.'

A grinning blue-eyed boy spoke to Guru-ji in German, and Guru-ji answered him very seriously. He nodded at me – over the boy's little shoulder – and said, ‘Yes. Like the other half of you is near you for a moment, but will be taken away.'

I struggled down the choking in my throat. So he was a man after all, an ordinary mortal who had suffered these pangs, and had felt loss. ‘What was her name, Guru-ji?'

He patted the boy on the shoulder, sent him away. He was looking towards me, but seeing something else, someone very far away. ‘What does it matter, Arjun? Names are lost in time. All infatuation leads to loss.'

‘Then what happened, Guru-ji? Was she sent away?'

‘This happened. And I went away, into injury and then into myself.'

Then he had become our Guru, and now he loved us instead of her, whoever she had been. No doubt she remembered their love also, but perhaps she was consoled by the fact that he loved her still, in a manner much more profound than the mere love of one small, ignorant mortal for another. I was nevertheless comforted by the knowledge that he had once been something like me. ‘Thank you,' I said, ‘Guru-ji, thank you for telling me.'

‘It's nothing much,' he said, and he was looking over his shoulder at the group of children, who had angled off, and were now running across the fields in a flashing of golden legs, with that boy leading.

The sadhus came up now, and I fell behind, carrying my knowledge of a young man in love like a new treasure in my breast. We walked on.

One of the sadhus was speaking to Guru-ji in French. This sadhu was Swiss, a balding, red-headed fellow, who had been given the name ‘Prem Shantam'. Guru-ji had all sorts in his following, and he spoke bits and pieces of many languages. He turned back to me now. ‘Arjun!'

I stepped up. ‘Guru-ji?'

‘Prem here tells me that up ahead there is a section of the park where these Germans give up all modesty. They lie around without any clothes on. He is suggesting that we do not go that way.'

‘Maybe we should avoid it, Guru-ji.'

‘Why? Are you afraid of seeing their bodies?'

‘Me? No, not at all. I am used to it, Guru-ji, from Thailand and all that.'

So we went ahead, down by a sparkling river. And there were the naked Germans, mostly men, lying on the grass and walking about naturally, quite without embarrassment. I had seen them on beaches far away, I was familiar with their white skin, their wrinkled behinds. But here I was vaguely disquieted. Here, in this city of churches and tall spires, this exhibition made no sense.

Prem said something, and Guru-ji translated for me, still gazing down at the river bank. ‘He says they call it “Free Body Culture”. I don't think it's free, or cultured. They are deluded. There is a time and place and an age for everything. There are stages in life when certain things are proper. A sadhu who meditates naked in a jungle is truly naked. He has left all culture behind. These people are still clothed in the traps of language. They think they are free, but they are bound by their rebellion against proper shame. Truly we live in Kaliyug, when everything is upside down.'

There were a few women among the naked, and two of them were watching us now. One was light-haired, typically German, but the other had thick, curly black hair, and she was very tall. She was a German all right, but her skin was tanned brown.

‘Come,' Guru-ji said. He folded his hands in a namaste at the girls. ‘They will think we are looking out of some dirty curiosity.'

He spun his wheelchair around. As we moved away, away from the river, I looked back and the dark item was watching us still. Guru-ji was right, she was shameless, fearless. Kutiya. But by the time we were back at the entrance to the park, I had forgotten about her. I was with Guru-ji, and I was much easier in my temper than usual. The irritation came and went. We went back to the mansion, and we ate a quiet lunch in the great hall, the sadhus and Guru-ji and I. And afterwards we sat in the garden next to the bedrooms again, enjoying the sunlight. I was sleepy and relaxed, content, not sad at all. If this was a node in time, the probabilities had all counted down to this silence. I was at peace.

‘There is something you haven't spoken to me about, Arjun,' Guru-ji said suddenly. ‘Is there something else?'

Of course there was. I should have known better than to keep it from him. He always knew. And not just with me – on his website there were testimonies from dozens, hundreds of devotees from all over the world that spoke of his ability to sense their troubles, to see through their hesitations. Somehow, he knew. ‘It's something very small, Guru-ji. After all the big things we have been talking about, it seems silly to even bring it up. That's why I kept quiet.'

‘Arjun, nothing is small if it bothers you. A small grain of sand can stop a mighty machine. Your consciousness controls the world you make, and if your mind is crippled, your world is broken down as well. So, tell me.'

‘It's the girl.'

‘The Muslim girl?'

‘Yes.'

‘What is wrong?'

‘Nothing exactly. I mean, I don't see her as often nowadays. She is very busy with her films and work. And I have much to do also. When we do meet, everything is good. She is beautiful. She is obedient.'

‘But?'

‘But sometimes I get afraid. I don't know. I don't know if she really loves me. I look at her and I watch her eyes, but I can't tell. She says she does. But does she love me?'

Guru-ji shook his head. ‘That's not a small question, Arjun. That is a big question. Even the sages can't look into a woman's heart. Vatsayayana himself wrote, “One never knows how deeply a woman is in love, even when one is her lover.” That is exactly what is happening here, to you.'

‘But you, Guru-ji, do you know?'

‘No, I do not. And even if I did tell you, that “Yes, she loves you,” what of it? Are you sure the same will be true tomorrow? Women are fickle, Arjun. They cannot control their emotions, they are changeable as prakriti itself. Would you try to love the weather for its constancy, or a river for staying in one place for all eternity? This bodily love is not love. It is only a momentary infatuation. It passes.'

‘Why then does she come back to me? And pretend?'

‘She is ruthless, Arjun. As long as she gains from you, you will feel that she might love you. That is the skill of the whore. It is a skill that comes naturally to women. It is not their fault, they must act from what they are made of. They are weak, and the weak have these kinds of weapons: lies, evasions, acting.' I must have looked sad, or exhausted, because he moved
over closer to me, so that he could rest a hand on my wrist. ‘You can only know this truth by experiencing it, Arjun. If I had told you not to be with her, you would have obeyed me. But you might have thought that I was a grumpy old man, suspicious of pleasures. But now you know. You have seen through maya. We have to go beyond this.' He pinched the flesh on my wrist between a thumb and a long forefinger. ‘This is useful, but it also blinds us. The pain you feel now is the gateway to wisdom. Learn from it.'

I knew he was right. And yet my flesh fought against it, against this decision I knew I must make. My stomach bubbled with hopelessness. Was there to be only this great bleakness, left behind by the vanishing illusion of love? I felt like I was standing on an endless open plain, every dead brown yard of which was lit by some strange, equalizing light. I saw this, and I winced away from its emptiness.

‘Yes, Arjun,' Guru-ji said. ‘Everything has been burnt up, and all that is left for you right now is ashes. But this grey desolation is also an illusion, just a step on your path. Trust me. Keep walking with me. Beyond this charnel house of romance, there is peace and a larger love.'

And he kept me close, for the rest of the day. We were together until I left, late that evening. He held me tightly, and the last words he said to me were, ‘Have faith, Arjun. Don't falter in your faith. I will be watching over you. Don't be afraid, beta.'

I wasn't afraid. I drove through the night, to Düsseldorf, and caught a plane to Hong Kong. I followed all procedures and protocols, my own tricks learnt over a lifetime, and also K.D. Yadav's tradecraft, to make sure I wasn't being followed. I did it out of habit, but I knew I was safe. I had Guru-ji's protection over my head. On the plane, I leaned my seat far back and went to sleep. I was very tired. In two days I had been reborn. Something had died in me, and now there was a newness in its place. Guru-ji had remade me again. Throughout that long flight, I dreamed of Guru-ji's hands. That was the one part of him that I took with me, this one close-up shot. He himself may have been divine, but his hands were of this world. They were small, and they were very white. His nails were absolutely clean. When I woke up, I wondered why I kept seeing these hands in my sleep, why they were so vividly real, so present, so human. He had given me a new name, and a new vision. And together we would set in motion a new cycle of time.