Baba silently chuckled and then explained, "You don't understand. That man came for water; his faith was connected with water. Had he not found water, he would have told people, 'Meher Baba asked me to dig five feet more and I did, but I did not find water. It was a sheer waste of money, time and energy to go to him. He deceived me.'
"But here you are. Your faith is not connected with anything. Whether you find water or not, whether your desires are fulfilled or not, your faith remains the same. So your faith is connected with me and not with anything else. Therefore, I can trust you. I cannot trust that man who came only for water. How truly fortunate you are that I can trust you; but if you want to be like him, you will find water. Decide whether you want water or you want me."
The mandali felt reconciled with this explanation.
Baba concluded, "Even if I started dancing naked before you, your faith in me would remain unshaken as you have accepted me as God. The villager's faith was based on an idol of hope, and God fulfilled his hope as He felt pity for him. God feels pity for you also — so He makes mincemeat out of you! I have kept you here with me not to satisfy your idol of hopes but to break that idol into pieces!"
Since retiring up the hill in the west room of the Water Tank, Baba's new schedule was to come down to lower Meherabad every afternoon and sit by the dhuni, from where he could survey the activities going on. It was noticed that while walking up and down the hill, Baba would halt two or three times along the way and act in a distinct manner — sometimes staring at the ground, at times tracing patterns in the dirt, or simply stopping and gazing into the distance, as if his thoughts were far, far away.
Age explains: "Baba was the Qutub, the pivot of the universe. So his every outer act was a reflection of his inner, invisible, spiritual working. The Avatar takes on the responsibility of planning the destiny of the world, and with that responsibility comes universal suffering which he must bear while he works on a universal scale for all beings."
That suffering was visible during October of 1926, while Baba was resting at night.