“Choose a girl who plays with dolls, choose an old maid of nineteen,” the king said. “But you can’t walk away without choosing someone.” They both knew that the future of the dynasty was at stake.
On the ceremonial day when all the hopeful brides were assembled at court, Siddhartha entered the hall in the same elaborate coat and plumed red turban he had worn when he turned eighteen. Each girl was prostrate on the floor, and as the prince walked down the line, he would catch a fetching or shy glance, a glint in one eye that promised sensual delight, in another a darting shyness that spoke of innocence and even bewilderment. Only one girl didn’t look up at him, keeping her veiled face to the floor. She made Siddhartha curious.
“A great day!” declared Suddhodana in a loud, jovial voice. But when his son walked into his embrace, he whispered in his ear, “None of your tricks. They’re not here so you can pray with them.”
Siddhartha knelt. “I know my duty, father.” As he turned around, a chamberlain ran up and handed him a garland of gold necklaces. Siddhartha pulled out a strand and approached the first girl.
“You are very beautiful. Why do you wish to marry me?” he asked, lifting her from the floor. Her direct gaze told him she wasn’t shy.
“Because you are kind and good. And handsome.” She gave him a seductive look, one that was well practiced. Siddhartha knew it was called “the assassin’s knife” in the manuals of love that noble girls were given to read. He bowed and handed her the gold necklace. He returned a smile that was gracious, but Siddhartha wasn’t practiced at hiding his feelings, and the girl knew she had no chance. Her father would be furious.
To the second girl he said, “If anyone could be even more beautiful, it’s you. Why do you want to marry me?”
The second girl had kept close watch on what happened to the first. She said, “To give you sons as magnificent as yourself.” Her voice had the ring of sincerity, but Siddhartha suspected that she was simply better trained. The love manuals taught that a man must always feel that he is making his own decisions while at the same time being carefully manipulated. If a woman was skillful, and applied eros when it was useful, he wouldn’t even know what was happening. Siddhartha bowed and handed the second girl a necklace. She put it on with a haughty toss of the head as he moved on.
The king felt anxious. “He doesn’t like any of them,” he whispered to Canki.
The high Brahmin was unruffled. He knew that discrimination can hold out against desire only so long. “Patience, sire. He’s a young man. When peaches are ripe, no one leaves the market without buying one.” But nothing about Siddhartha’s manner looked promising by the time he had reached the last girl. She looked up at him but didn’t remove her veil.
From behind the girl, her father nudged her with a fierce whisper. “Go ahead. Get up and look at him!” She took a moment before rising. Now Siddhartha remembered who she was. The one girl who had made him curious.
“I cannot tell if you are beautiful,” he said. “What’s your name?”
“Yashodhara.”
“May I see you?”
She kept her veil on. “Is my appearance the only thing that would make me worthy? If so, don’t look at me. My face might conceal a false heart.”
Siddhartha smiled. “A good answer. Then tell me: Why do you wish to marry me?”
“I’m not sure yet. I don’t know you, and you haven’t made any pretty speeches, the way you did to the others.”
Siddhartha was intrigued by these words, but he also had to see her. He lifted Yashodhara’s veil. She wasn’t beautiful in the way the first girls had been, modeled from the pages of the love manuals. But instantly he knew how he felt.
“You’re wonderful, because you were made to be loved.”
Up to this moment she had had the advantage, but now Yashodhara blushed. “That was a pretty speech, but too short for me to make up my mind. My father will be so disappointed if I come away empty-handed. Can I have a necklace?”
She held out her hand and Siddhartha frowned. “Was that a good enough reason for you to come here?”
She replied, “Sire, I live in the deep woods, four long days’ journey from here. My father is very anxious that I marry you. But a gold necklace can feed a hundred of my starving people, those I left behind.”
“Girl!” her father rebuked.
Siddhartha held up his hand. “It’s all right.” He bowed to Yashodhara. “With your first words I found that you are honest, and now I find that you are also kind. What more can I wish for?” He took her hand and led her to kneel before the king as the hall rang with cheers. There was no need for a long betrothal. Just as Siddhartha said, Yashodhara was a woman who existed to be loved, and their union was as real as Suddhodana’s with Maya. Yet it was known to both of them, if to no one else in the world, that Yashodhara had wept inconsolably on their honeymoon night.
Siddhartha turned red. “If I was clumsy or did something wrong—”
She put a finger to his lips. “No, don’t.”
“Then why are you so unhappy? An hour ago you seemed to be in love.”
“An hour ago I didn’t realize that you are going to leave me one day.”
He smothered her with kisses to reassure her and chided her gently about being a superstitious girl like the maids who ran to the temple for a good luck charm if they spilled the milk. Yashodhara’s words were never repeated between them. Ten years wasn’t enough to erase the memory, however, and when it came to pass that her husband did decide to leave her, Yashodhara was crushed by seeing her premonition come true.
All these memories danced before Gautama’s mind along with the image of his wife. The recollection of her sorrow was the only thing that enabled him to defeat his arousal. Gautama’s back slumped, and he wondered for the first time since finding his master if abandoning his family wasn’t an unforgivable sin.
Suddenly Gautama felt a stinging pain on one cheek. He opened his eyes to see his master standing over him, hand raised. Sharply the hand came down and slapped the other cheek.
“Why did you do that, sir? What did I do to offend you?”
The old hermit shrugged. “Nothing. You smelled like a man who sleeps with women. I knocked the stink off.”
This incident stuck in Gautama’s mind for two reasons—because it permanently banished any images of Yashodhara from his mind, and because it was the most words in a row that the hermit had spoken. But his master wasn’t setting a precedent for garrulousness. Weeks passed, the monsoons came, and he said not another word. This became a time of great peace for Gautama. One day he went for firewood but couldn’t find any that wasn’t soaked from the rains. He recalled a cavern formed by fallen boulders where perhaps some dry logs might have lodged.
Walking through the woods, he felt the rain coming down, but the monsoons were warm and he was toughened by months of exposure. His body didn’t shiver or his mind complain. Yet as he kept walking, Gautama noticed that he started feeling chilled, and a hundred yards farther on he was shaking badly. By the time he reached the cavern of boulders, he felt quite uncomfortable and his mind was attacking him mercilessly. Go home. This crazy master is going to turn you into his slave or a crazy recluse like himself. Run! It was as if he’d been taken back to his first day on the road.
He found an armful of dry kindling, and when the rain abated he headed back to camp. Now the process reversed itself. The closer he got to the small clearing, the better he felt. His mind calmed down, and the shivering in his limbs subsided. As he set foot in camp and saw his master again, perfect peace descended like a curtain over his whole being. Gautama stared at the old hermit in wonder.
“Mara.”
Gautama was startled. “What?”
“Mara is interested in you.” Gautama opened his mouth, but the hermit shook his head abruptly. “You know it’s true. You knew it before you came here.”
Gautama trembled, sensing that a gulf was opening up between himself and his master. He was surprised at
how afraid this made him feel. “I haven’t thought of Mara in years,” he protested.
“And so you kept him away. For a time.”
The hermit breathed a deep sigh, as if he had to remind his body how to return to the physical world before he could say another word. A few agonizing moments passed. Siddhartha felt his heart sink. If he can smell that I have a wife, what must a demon smell like? he thought.
The hermit said, “Mara will keep away from me. He has no interest in feeding when the bowl is empty. You are different.”
“What interest could he have in me?” asked Gautama.
“You don’t know?” The old hermit saw the look of bafflement in his disciple’s eyes. “There’s something he can’t let you find out. You must go beyond anything I can teach. That’s the only way to rid yourself of the demon,” his master said.
Gautama felt panicky. He bowed to the ground and seized the hermit’s gnarled feet. “At least tell me what I’m looking for.”
When he got no reply, Gautama glanced up to see that the old hermit had closed his eyes again and was far away. The disciple could barely sleep that night. When he woke up before dawn he saw no dark outline against the night sky. His master had left. Grief overwhelmed Gautama, and yet deep down he wasn’t completely shocked—his master could only do the right thing. That was their bond, and he would never betray it. At that moment leaving had been the right thing.
Gautama could have hung around camp for a few hours or perhaps a day to see if his abandonment was only temporary. But the storm in his heart and the return of despairing thoughts told him something definitive. His master had withdrawn his protection; therefore, their relationship had come to an end. Carefully the young monk tidied up the camp. He swept the ground and put a fresh gourd of water beside the place under the lean-to where the hermit sat. Then he bowed to the grass mat that had been his master’s only throne and departed.
As it turned out, one shred of their relationship was left. As he trudged back to the main road several miles away, Gautama fell to musing. He saw the hermit’s face and its look of pity. He heard his own desperate plea, “At least tell me what I’m looking for.” The hermit turned implacable; he closed his eyes and refused to speak. Only this time the answer came silently in Gautama’s mind.
There is one thing Mara can never let you find out: the truth about who you really are.
14
Gautama wandered down the road, his whole being churning with what the hermit had told him. Before he left his father’s kingdom he had fought against Mara the only way he knew how—by trying to alleviate suffering and want wherever he could. Saints persevere even though the tide of suffering rolls back in despite their compassion. Mara had survived a lot of saints. What was one more?
But a strange new element had been added. The forest hermit implied that the demon was afraid of Gautama. But why? Demons are immortal; they can’t be harmed physically. The riddle went even deeper. Gautama seemed to be the only person Mara feared.
These thoughts kept turning over in Gautama’s head like wheels within wheels. How remarkable that in one day all the peace he had gained with his master in the forest had come undone. Why even seek a teacher if the same thing would only happen again? Gautama muttered the only words of consolation that he could remember.
“Surrender and be free.”
“Did you say something, brother?”
“What?” Gautama looked up to see another monk about his age. “How long have you been standing there?”
“A few minutes. Care to join us? You’ve got a hungry look about you. There’s a well-off farmer up the road, and his wife doesn’t exactly hate me.” The young monk spoke with a half smile and a sense of assurance. Gautama rose and followed him down the shade-dappled dirt road. At the next bend he saw a patch of brilliant saffron flash through the trees, and when a small band of monks rounded the bend, the one Gautama was with waved to them. “Press on!” he shouted.
Gautama remained silent, melting into the group like a stray fish merging back into its school. The monk who had gathered him in was taller and older than the others. “Where are you headed?” he asked.
“East.” Gautama replied. There were big towns toward the east, and with large populations there would be more ashrams and all the famous teachers. He’d ask for help with his dilemma.
“Who are you?” the taller monk asked.
Gautama gave his name and the taller monk gave his: Pabbata.
“We’ll take you as far east as we’re headed,” Pabbata said. “You’ll be safer in a pack. These four scruffs are my cousins.”
“You all wanted to be monks?” asked Gautama with surprise.
Pabbata laughed sheepishly. “We all wanted to see more of life than a quarter-acre field that the jungle tries to take back every year.” His cousins nodded in assent. They began to chat among themselves, ignoring the stranger, and it didn’t take long for Gautama to take their measure. These were typical young men, all but Pabbata still adolescents, who needed to get out and stretch. They eyed every pretty farm girl who passed by on the road, joked with anyone who spoke their dialect, eagerly asked for news and gossip if they were lucky enough to meet a villager from near their home. Gautama didn’t have to close his eyes for the disguise of saffron robes to vanish.
“Have you found a Dharma?” he asked Pabbata when there was a lull and the group fell relatively quiet. He expected the taller monk to answer indifferently or with a joke, but his face lit up.
“I think about the Dharma night and day,” he said.
His cousins laughed, and one said, “He’s the serious one. We let him think for the rest of us.”
Pabbata’s spine stiffened. “Without a teaching, we’re no better than shiftless beggars.” This rebuke, mild as it was, irked his cousins, who sped up and left Gautama and Pabbata to trail behind. Gautama was glad to see them go.
Suddenly Pabbata asked, “Do you know why I stopped for you?”
“You seem kind.”
“Maybe. Fat lot of good that does you on these roads. No, it was something else. I was trudging behind my cousins, cursing the heat, thinking about someone I left behind, if you know what I mean. All at once I felt this cool breeze, and when I looked in the shadows, there you were. You understand?”
“No.”
Pabbata looked disbelieving. “You’re putting me on, right?”
When Gautama didn’t reply, the taller monk’s eyes widened. “You mean you don’t know? It was you. I felt your presence.”
Siddhartha could feel himself flush a deep scarlet. “That’s impossible. Let me assure you—”
“Assure me?” Pabbata guffawed. “I had a feeling you were high-caste. Look at you, even saying that makes you go red.”
Gautama was drawn to the tall countrified monk. He said, “I’ve been with a saint in the forest. I felt his presence. Every day, every minute. It made me—I don’t know what it made me.”
“Drunk, maybe. That type can throw you off your head, that’s for sure.” Pabbata stopped for a second and then replied, “So you must be a saint too. Like attracts like, isn’t that how it works?”
“Not in this case.”
Pabbata shook his head, frowning. “You shouldn’t talk about yourself that way. Karma is shy. It’s easy to drive the good kind away.” He sped up to rejoin his cousins. Gautama lagged behind, and after a moment he heard loud laughter and banter. He was tempted to fade back and lose the other monks, but he didn’t. Pabbata looked over his shoulder and saw Gautama a few yards behind them.
“Don’t be shy, princess!”
The jibe, like everything Pabbata said, was good-natured. Gautama could do worse than travel in such company. Maybe the next town or the next teacher could offer him some answer. And so the saffron-clad sojourners walked on together for several days. Gautama lightened the time between farmhouses by finding fruit and fresh water that the others couldn’t spy; in return, they were much more persuasive beggars and flirted with the c
ountry wives for extra roti and rice. “This one makes good mango pickle. It’s worth a kiss behind the barn,” one of the cousins said with a wink.
One morning Gautama had gotten up before dawn, as he was accustomed to do with his master, and meditated in the faint blue-gray light. He washed himself in a stream and shaved his beard with the sharp shell of a freshwater mussel. As he walked back to camp, he felt a strange sensation. After a moment he realized a cool breeze was tickling the back of his neck. The morning was already heavy with heat, and he stopped. He raised one hand and could definitely feel a cool current of air around his head. Gautama had felt such a sensation around his master without comprehending why.
Gautama turned his steps and headed back toward the main road instead of to camp. He hadn’t met a better person the whole time he’d been wandering. And yet he couldn’t stay now, not if it meant being turned into a false god.
Emerging from the thick jungle growth, Gautama saw that the main road was crowded with travelers. He ducked his head and kept as close to himself as possible. But he couldn’t help becoming part of the passing parade. Farmers’ carts were a constant sight, trundling to market and home again. There was the occasional merchant caravan, usually surrounded by armed guards to protect the precious bales of silk and spice stowed in a horse-drawn wagon.
Gautama regarded them all with troubled eyes. They were like phantoms to him, no longer made of flesh and blood. They were dream images that he could pass his hand through if they came close enough. As their bodies faded, he saw something else more clearly. Each person carried an invisible burden. The young monk was amazed that he hadn’t seen it before. Everyone walked or rode with their lives on their shoulders, a pack of memories that spilled over with disappointment and sorrow. This one had never recovered from losing a wife in childbirth. That one was afraid of starving. That other one fretted over a runaway son who may have died in battle. And always there was the pall of age and sickness, the endless worry over money, the unceasing doubts about the future.