Dijen was silent, but glared at me suspiciously. After we had escorted our guru to his hermitage, my friend and I proceeded toward Serampore College. Dijen halted in the street, indignation streaming from his every pore. “So! Master sent me a message! Yet you concealed it! I demand an explanation!” “Can I help it if your mental mirror oscillates with such restlessness that you cannot register our guru’s instructions?” I retorted. The anger vanished from Dijen’s face. “I see what you mean,” he said ruefully. “But please explain how you could know about the child with the jug.” By the time I had finished the story of Master’s phenomenal appearance at the boardinghouse that morning, my friend and I had reached Serampore College. “The account I have just heard of our guru’s powers,” Dijen said, “makes me feel that any university in the world is only a kindergarten.” {FN19-1} The Bengali “Good-by”; literally, it is a hopeful paradox: “Then I come.” {FN19-2} The characteristic sound of dematerialization of bodily atoms. CHAPTER: 20 WE DO NOT VISIT KASHMIR “Father, I want to invite Master and four friends to accompany me to the Himalayan foothills during my summer vacation. May I have six train passes to Kashmir and enough money to cover our travel expenses?” As I had expected, Father laughed heartily. “This is the third time you have given me the same cock-and-bull story. Didn’t you make a similar request last summer, and the year before that? At the last moment, Sri Yukteswarji refuses to go.” “It is true, Father; I don’t know why my guru will not give me his definite word about Kashmir. {FN20-1} But if I tell him that I have already secured the passes from you, somehow I think that this time he will consent to make the journey.” Father was unconvinced at the moment, but the following day, after some good-humored gibes, he handed me six passes and a roll of ten-rupee bills. “I hardly think your theoretical trip needs such practical props,” he remarked, “but here they are.” That afternoon I exhibited my booty to Sri Yukteswar. Though he smiled at my enthusiasm, his words were noncommittal: “I would like to go; we shall see.” He made no comment when I asked his little hermitage disciple, Kanai, to accompany us. I also invited three other friends—Rajendra Nath Mitra, Jotin Auddy, and one other boy. Our date of departure was set for the following Monday. On Saturday and Sunday I stayed in Calcutta, where marriage rites for a cousin were being celebrated at my family home. I arrived in Serampore with my luggage early Monday morning. Rajendra met me at the hermitage door. “Master is out, walking. He has refused to go.” I was equally grieved and obdurate. “I will not give Father a third chance to ridicule my chimerical plans for Kashmir. Come; the rest of us will go anyhow.”