“My father, to me none of these things is important. I intend to become a sadhu.”
Even then Sirdar Singh did not grasp the full horror of what his son said. A sadhu was a Hindu saint. To be a Hindu saint meant renunciation and poverty, dreadful enough for a rich man’s ears to hear. But the next words his son spoke were even more awful. Jehar said,
“I do not mean a Hindu sadhu, my father. I mean a Christian sadhu.”
“What is a Christian sadhu?” Sirdar Singh demanded. He was a tall strong man, as Sikhs are, but in late years he had given up restraints and had grown exceedingly fat, so that his figure was now immense.
“I shall travel on foot over India,” Jehar said, “teaching and preaching as Jesus did, but I shall remain an Indian. As an Indian I will portray an Indian Christ, such as He might have been had He been born among us.”
“Where did you get this mad idea?” Sirdar Singh asked in great terror. “I am sure you did not get it from Dr. MacArd.”
“I got it from no one,” Jehar replied. “It came to me when I was reading the Christian scriptures.”
Though it was now past midnight and the whole compound was quiet, Sirdar Singh could fix upon only one idea.
“Let us go to Dr. MacArd,” he gasped. “I must have help from him.”
So it was that the quiet of the mission house was broken and all the household set stirring by tremendous beating on the gate by the Sirdar’s bearers at midnight, reinforced by the Sirdar’s own bellowing. The gateman opened the gate and at once ran to call his master.
“Sahib, Sahib,” he shouted at David’s door. “The Sirdar is here in distress. There is something wrong with his son.”
These were the cries that Ted heard also from his own room, his door open because of the heat. He got up from his bed and put on his silk dressing robe and went down the hall to his father’s room. There the light was already shining and he knocked and went in and found his father dressing himself, in haste but still with suitable formality.
Meanwhile the Sikhs, father and son, were waiting downstairs.
“Shall I come, Father?” Ted asked.
David threw a glance toward him. “Yes, but get into your clothes.”
“Yes, Father.”
A few minutes later when Ted went downstairs, he found the drawing room door shut and all the servants and bearers waiting outside on the verandas. He opened the door and went in. The Sirdar was sitting on the long couch and on a chair near him was Jehar, listening to what his father said, but with no air of repentance, although with full respect.
Ted knew the young man, having taught him English literature, and he remembered him especially because Jehar had revealed a poetic talent and a quick perception of the quality of beauty.
The Sirdar stopped abruptly in what was obviously a verbal torrent as the door opened.
“My son,” David said. “He has been Jehar’s teacher and I have asked him to be present.”
The Sirdar gave an upheaving sigh. “Is he a Christian?” he demanded.
“Naturally, he is,” David replied.
The Sirdar turned to Jehar. “You see this, here is a young man who is even a Christian but he does not talk of being a sadhu! No, he is a comfort to his father. He teaches in his father’s university. He obeys his father, and his father trusts him.”
Jehar turned his head to look at Ted, and gave him a shy smile. “Are you a Christian?” he asked.
So absolute was the honesty in this question that Ted felt humble.
“I wish to be,” he said, “and I hope that I am.”
Sirdar Singh listened to this, sighed loudly, and turned to the other father. He began once more to plead. “I did put my son into your hands. Dr. MacArd. I wished that he be taught how the Americans do everything. The Americans are strong and rich and very powerful and they will become more powerful. They will be the only ones who can fight against Russia when that day comes as already we can see it must come. We have had one world war and there will be still another. Everybody is saying it. After the next world war the English will be weak but the Americans will be strong. I wish to stand with the Americans at that time. So I sent my son to you. Surely I did not expect him to become a Christian. This was not my wish.”
The Sirdar’s English was excellent but he was beginning to lose the idiom.
“I suppose, Sirdar,” David said calmly, “that if you send your son to a mission university you must take the risk of his becoming Christian. But you cannot expect me to agree that being a Christian is so dreadful a fate as you seem to imagine. A good number of our students are Christian before they graduate, and although we do not make the attempt deliberately, we hope that the atmosphere of MacArd is such that they will wish to become Christian. There is no compulsion, however. We believe in freedom.”
“I also believe in freedom,” the Sirdar said eagerly. “I have always given my son much freedom, except he is compelled to remember he is my son and he cannot act in such ways as my son should not act. Therefore he cannot renounce all his inherited wealth which he will have from me, and become a sadhu.”
David could not repress his surprise. “A sadhu?”
“Well, he wishes to become a Christian sadhu,” the Sirdar cried more agitated.
“But this is impossible,” David replied. “A sadhu is a Hindu, not a Christian.
“A sadhu is a saint,” Jehar said. “I shall be a Christian sadhu.”
“I have never heard of such a person,” David said.
“Now you will hear of me,” Jehar said gently.
“You see!” the Sirdar exclaimed.
He spread out his large fat hands. “What will you do, Dr. MacArd? This boy is very stubborn. I know that. He has always been stubborn from birth. And his mother is dead. She cannot help me.”
Ah, Ted thought, now what will my father do? He was suddenly deeply excited by what was happening. The young Indian was extraordinary, his face, always so delicately handsome, took on in the lamplight an unearthly beauty. He sat with motionless grace, his hands lightly clasped in his lap, his white garments flowing about him.
“Will you do as the sadhus do?” Ted asked. “Jehar, will you wander about from village to village?”
“As Jesus did,” Jehar answered, and his dark eyes were quiet with peace.
“You see, you see!” the Sirdar wailed.
“Sirdar Singh,” David spoke with decision. “Leave this to me, please. It is clear that Jehar does not understand what he is saying. He has confused two religions, Hinduism and Christianity. They are not to be confused. I suppose you have no objection if he wishes merely to be a Christian?”
“Certainly not,” the Sirdar said in his ardent eager fashion. “Let him be a Christian if he likes, but as you are, sir, Dr. MacArd. Let him be a reasonable man, though Christian, it is all I ask. Let him remain my son, which he cannot be if he is a sadhu.”
“Then leave him to me,” David said. “It is very late, you are tired, and Jehar has been excited by the day. Tomorrow I will talk with him myself, and I will explain to him what it means to be a Christian. Certainly he cannot be a sadhu. The Christian church would not recognize him.”
“Thank you, sir, thank you, Dr. MacArd,” the Sirdar cried warmly. He clasped his hands on his bosom. “If you knew! But my only hope is in you. I know now this son never listens to his old father. I have done everything for him, how much money it has cost me to send him here for four years, and he ends by talking of sadhus! You see how my money would be wasted. Really, there is some responsibility for you, my dear sir.”