He preferred a spot eleven miles outside the city near a lake. Walter was asked to prepare a master plan for it.1 A rough plan was drawn up, discussed and altered. Maharaja Kisan Prasad, Maula Ali and other influential persons felt confident, because of all this work, that Meher Baba was seriously considering moving to Hyderabad.
On several occasions, Baba took the women to see the Golconda Fort and other places of interest in Hyderabad.
After a few more days of discussion about starting the new center in Hyderabad, when the plan was about to be finalized and put into effect, suddenly, on 15 December, Baba declared to those involved, "I have to proceed to Jabalpur on work, and I am going there at once. On my return we will discuss things further."2
During their brief stay in Hyderabad, Pleader was sent to contact a sixth-plane mastani, called Mastani Mai .
Baba commented, "She holds the key to all of Hyderabad in her hands."
Although Baba did not contact the 60-year-old woman directly, he instructed Pleader to tell her that he was there in her city. Hedi and Walter were later sent with Pleader to the street where she lived to take her photograph. The woman, who was nearly naked all the time, resembled Babajan.
On the morning of Saturday, 17 December 1938, Baba and the women left Hyderabad at 8:20 A.M. for Nagpur. On the way, he directed Elizabeth to drive fast and, as they neared the town of Nanded, he told her to drive even faster!3 The bus was overloaded and to drive at such a speed was dangerous, but Elizabeth obeyed. Suddenly, Baba ordered her to stop the bus, and he got down. A mast was walking by the roadside. In order to catch and contact him, Baba had wished to hurry. Baba contacted the man under a tree alongside the road.
It was getting dark so they stayed at the dak bungalow in Nanded. They could not see well enough to separate the bedding rolls from the pile of other baggage, so again they had to be content with sleeping on chairs, tables or the floor. Thus, the women were having the contrasting experiences of sleeping in a palace one night and on the floor of a wayside bungalow the next! Kaka and Eruch slept in the bus, as usual.
Footnotes
- 1.Walter Mertens was a highly successful landscape architect by profession.
- 2.In a letter to Adi Sr. (dated 20 December 1938), Baba explained further: "In spite of all the best they all tried to give us comfort in Hyderabad, there were so many complications that made our stay there rather uncomfortable and even unsuitable for the work. I therefore decided to leave it abruptly which gave them all a shock literally."
- 3.At one time Nanded was also known as Nander.