Baba inquired.
"Didn't you hear me? Bring the food to my room."
Masaji replied hesitatingly, "Every day I saved
your lunch, but you never ate it."
"But today I want it," Baba insisted.
"Where is it?"
Masaji confessed giving it to Adi, and Baba
castigated him for an hour , warning him to follow his orders
literally and not to use his mind in obeying him.
During this period,
Baba visited the house of the jeweler Kaikhushru Masa in Parel with Adi
and Gustadji. Kaikhushru Masa was absent, but his wife Soonamasi and
daughter Khorshed, along with an aunt Motibai, were having lunch. Mounting the stairs, without knocking, Baba entered their house and went
straight into their kitchen, leaving Adi and Gustadji behind. The Master
was dressed in his usual attire — a long white shirt, white cotton
pants and an Irani kerchief around his head. Seeing this stranger burst
in upon them, the aunt exclaimed, "Who is this madcap?"
Soonamasi and Khorshed immediately recognized Baba,
whom they had met in Sakori in May. Both received him with great
reverence, while Motibai felt quite ashamed. Baba informed them that he
was now residing in the city and said, "Tell Masa to come and see
me at the Manzil early every morning, before going to his shop, and in
the evening also.
Khorshed, too, should visit me daily after school. Soonamasi, you may come at any time during the day."
Baba then
departed, leaving them excited at the prospect of seeing him every
day.
Khorshed began going to Manzil-e-Meem
each afternoon at 4:00 P.M. Some time later, her cousins, Piroja and
Dolly (Gulmai's daughters), came to Bombay to study, and all three
girls would visit Baba. He would ask them what they were learning in
school, and they would reply with innocent candor. Occasionally, he
would play a particular game with them. The girls would stand together
in front of him, with their hands on both ears, and Baba would pretend
to throw a ball at one of them. If, in her eagerness to catch it, one
let go of her ears she was out. Likewise, if Baba actually threw the
ball, and it struck her before she was able to catch it, she was
declared out. Baba became an animated playmate for these children. It was such fun that all three wished to stay at the Manzil the whole day and skip school.
While at Manzil-e-Meem, Baba would seldom allow
outsiders to meet him. However, on Sunday, 2 July 1922, a devout Muslim
professor of Deccan College named Hyder Ibrahim Sayani was introduced
to the Master.1
Footnotes
- 1.In 1903, Professor Sayani and his brother had been on the same ship as Babajan, when she made her second pilgrimage to Mecca.