Christmas is coming and Tom is buying gifts for the guesthouse. Before he arrived here, the walls were already covered with pictures of the Founder and the Mother in various stages of life and death. Tom has bought even bigger frames, to put in them even larger photographs. Soon, eating or sleeping, these enormous faces will be smiling or frowning at him. He speaks often to Deborah and me of the power of the Mother, which Her Ladyship has named "Mother-power."

"Nothing is stronger than Mother power," Tom tells us. His favourite tale concerns the settlers at Ice Cream, the ashram utopia city. One day, attacked by murderous Tamils, one of them called upon the Mother for help and all the Tamils suddenly fell down.

"The story you are about to hear is very, very difficult to believe," Deborah, who is ashamed, warns. "In fact, it's impossible to believe."

Then turning to Tom: "Go ahead."

"The story you are about to hear," Tom says, "is impossible to believe, but it is true." Then he tells the story. But his own faith in it is weakening. Now he says he supposes the Ice Cream settler started shouting the Mother's name and the superstitious Tamils dropped in fright.

"Do you believe that all the Tamils actually fell down?" asks Deborah.

"Yes, as a matter of fact I do. Now look, Chickie, don't blow this for me. All the Tamils fell down."

Then, today, Deborah herself had her "first and hopefully last mystical experience." She had been reading alone in the patio. Evil-eye, typing until then in a far corner, came over and sat down in the next chair. Then, without a word, the witch started making rapid notes in her copy-book.

"She would whip her head around and squint hard at me out of her good eye," Deborah told us afterward, clutching her throat, "and then scribble madly on the pad. I guessed immediately that she was describing my physical appearance. She never said a word, just kept writing. I got up, went to my room, and lay down on the bed. It was absolutely clear that Evil-eye was going to send this description to doll-makers in Germany who would make a doll just like me and send it back. Then one day I would start feeling terrible pains — no doctor would be able to diagnose them — because it was Evil-eye sticking pins in the doll. Awful pains." She pressed her heart dramatically. "But the worst part was: There was absolutely nothing I could do to prevent this happening. By the simple accident of being in Villefranche at the same moment with Evil-eye, and maybe having laughed at that article about the murder, I'd doomed myself."

She continued: "I lay there in real panic, realizing that in just five minutes I'd become as superstitious as an ignorant Tamil. What to do? Then, as I was glancing about in wild desperation, my eyes fell on a photo of the Mother smiling down at me from the wall. I recalled what Tom had said about the Mother's power being so strong..."

"Right on," said Tom.

"...and I was sure it was stronger than Evil-eye's. The Mother would protect me. I was overjoyed with relief. I figured if I were to wear a talisman of the Mother around my neck, then Evil-eye could never hurt me."

"You betchum," Tom nodded. "And by coincidence I just had made these two talismen. " He pulled from his pocket two chains with pendants fashioned in the ashram insignia. "Mother will bless them. You can take your pick or even have both."

Deborah looked, but wouldn't touch them. "I couldn't possibly wear a talisman," she told Tom. "I couldn't give in to superstition like that. Could you?"

"No."

"Then why did you have these made?"

"I thought for you."

"Not for me, thanks."

"As you wish." Tom put them back into his pocket.

"You just like to spend money."

"That's right."

"Thank you anyway."

Tom is from Massachusetts, Deborah from the diagonal opposite, Los Angeles. His mother is a Catholic, descended from an aristocratic English-Italian family; her mother was a New York Jewess. Tom's mother is alive; Deborah lost hers some years ago. Their fathers are retired. Deborah's father was earlier in business; Tom's, a Catholic convert, was a famous Air Force general, then later in government service in Washington, D.C.

"My mother believes in Original Sin," Tom told us one evening, "and she's very strong on the Immaculate Conception."

"I've recently learned, from sundry relatives, that my mother was a nymphomaniac," (!) said Deborah. "Until then I used to think she and my father only did it twice, for me and my sister."

"My mother only did do it twice," Tom said. "For me and my sister.

"Nonsense. All children of our generation think that about their parents."

"I happen to know."

"Mothers always talk virtuous, but they play around just like we do."

"Like you do, Chickie."

"I'm not playing," said Deborah, looking at him grimly. "I mean business."

"She means business," cried Tom, kicking his long legs into the air. "I'm getting out of here."

They both laughed heartily, neither making a move to leave his chair.

"Are you thinking soon to leave Villefranche?" I asked Deborah.

"I haven't decided yet." She looked around. "The days are going by and I'm still here. I can’t seem to make decisions."

"Why don't you ask the I Ching?" said Tom.

"That's right. We were going to throw some dice or something."

"Coins." He got to his feet. "Let's go to the room. You can ask it your question."

Going into the back garden we saw Evil-eye coming out of Tom and Deborah's bathroom with a roll of toilet paper. "My dear," cried Deborah, "haven't those monsters given you your daily roll? Take ours, take ours."

"They don't give me any anymore," growled Evil-eye, disappearing into her bathroom.

"She eats it faster than they can buy it," sighed Tom.

"Doesn't matter, doesn't matter," said Deborah quickly. "She can have all of ours."

"What's this sudden love?"

"No love, but I've found a way to avoid becoming superstitious and wearing a talisman."

"How's that?"

"I'm sucking up like mad to Evil-eye."

I do not know if often ashram houses hear so much laughter, so no wonder the other guests looked at us with suspicious faces. "Chickie," Tom cried, "I had so much credit before you came. Juney and Evil-eye loved me. Now look at them. Everything's blown."

"That's nothing," Deborah assured him. "Wait until Evil-eye starts measuring you for a doll."

"Mother!" screamed Tom, clutching his throat.

Tom has occupied his room already two months, paying, to be fair, the double rate. Though Deborah has moved in and he out, many of his possessions remain. Against the wall behind the bed leans the huge teak frame which he had made for a photograph of the Mother, but such a large photograph has not yet been found. On each side of the door are the ram-shaped brass handles he had made because the door was sticking.

"How come you had two made?" asked Deborah as we went inside. "It just occurred to me you don't need a handle to push."

"Shut up."

"You could just have had them plane the door a little if it was sticking."

"It didn't occur to me, so shut up."

"Why goats?"

"That's Aries the Ram. If you weren't such an ignorant fucking bitch, you might know."

Deborah laughed, not taking his words at all to heart.

In one corner of Tom's room is an altar with a photograph of the Founder in the center. On each side of this are exotic French brass candlesticks looking like leaves and flowers and polished "by fifty little Tamil hands" (Tom's words). In front, many stainless-steel sambar bowls filled with tiny chrysanthemums, brought each morning by Tom from the ashram nursery and arranged in circles according to their colour.

"Are you ready to be a bit serious?" Tom asked Deborah.

"I is."

Then from a box he took a small, thick carpet, the same as I had seen for sale in the ashram handweaving shop. It was yellow with a white design.

"This design is a yantra," he explained to Deborah, "like those drawings you see on the street in front of the Tamil people's doorways. Yantras symbolize the Goddess Sakti, the life force, the divine power, which some of us prefer to imagine in Mother form rather than like young, nubile chicks. Actually, this is a fairly poor example," he frowned, pressing aside the thick wool with his fingers as if thinking some of the design had fallen down inside. "They're supposed to be drawn with one continuous line. Now, do you know what a mantra is?"

"A mantra? Of course."

"And the Tantra?"

"Yes."

"What's a mantra?"

Deborah frowned a moment. Then her face straightened. "I haven't the foggiest."

Tom threw down the carpet. "What the fuck is a stupid broad like you doing in India?"

"I'm beginning to wonder." Deborah looked as if she was ready right then to go pack her bags.

Tom picked up the carpet, which had fallen yantra down on cigarette ashes. He brushed it off. "Look, we have to go about this thing seriously if we want to consult the I Ching. Have you phrased your question?"

"What question?"

"The one you wanted it to answer."

"Which one was that?"

I volunteered: "I believe you wanted to ask it whether or not to leave Villefranche before seeing the Mother."

Deborah nodded thoughtfully. "Hold on." She thought another minute. "All right. I've phrased my question."

"What is it?" asked Tom.

"That's my business."

"You've got to say the question out loud. That's part of it. Or at least write it down."

"I'll write it down. In my notebook."

While Deborah was doing this, Tom arranged the little carpet on the floor. He lighted a piece of incense looking like a blue finger, then set it into a silver cup. He lighted the red and green Christmas candles in the altar candle holders, turning out then all the electric lights except one small one by the bed, which shone on the photograph of the Mother in its silver frame. The room was suddenly mystical and smelling very holy.

From the top of a wardrobe he then took down a golden cloth, from this a book. "This isn't my copy," he told us. "I got this one from Mary who wanted to borrow mine which has a different translation. But this one is just as good. The I Ching book," he went on to explain, "is supposed to be kept more than shoulder height above the floor when not being used." He motioned for Deborah to go down on the yellow rug. She did so. Her knees sank into the soft wool near the smoking incense.

"Now the real I Ching thing is to use fifty yarrow stalks which..." he glanced behind him "...we don't happen to have. So instead we use three coins. I use these ten-paise coins." Opening his hand he showed us the familiar tenths of rupees that we in India use daily. "Real I Ching coins are round, have square holes in the centers, and are inscribed on only one side. Now..." He stopped speaking. Out of the pages of the borrowed book had fallen a tiny envelope of exotic handmade paper on which was written in a graceful script: I CHING COINS.

We stared at the little envelope. Everything now seemed very spooky. The candlelight threw weird shadows about the room. It lighted our faces. We looked at each other, very apprehensive.

"I didn't know Mary had I Ching coins," said Tom softly. He opened the envelope and emptied the contents into his hand. We all leaned closer to see.

"Five-paise coins!" said Deborah. We were so surprised it was several seconds before we began to laugh. "What's with this Mary?"

"What's with Mary?" shouted Tom, rocking backward with laughter. "Five-paise coins!"

In a few minutes we had gathered our wits together once more. "What's your question, Chickie?" asked Tom, snapping his fingers as if impatient.

"Just tell me what to do," she replied evasively.

I was sure the question concerned her going or staying, and am still hoping she will leave Villefranche before becoming too involved with Tom. Such charming dilettantes have always attracted girls, but this is not what Deborah needs, rather a man of more education and experience in life. She is a much more intelligent girl than Erde — what one could teach her! — things she would never hear about in her southern California university with its swimming pools and bowling alleys and ping-pong rooms. I feel that if she will leave the ashram now I could convince her to come with me to Ceylon, not at first perhaps as man and wife, as with Erde, but as two intelligent beings searching the joys of study. (Little did I then imagine how in a so short time my dreams would be fulfilled.)

"Is your question properly phrased?" asked Tom.

"Yeah, man." They looked at each other a long moment. Tom made pretense of wiping perspiration from his front with his sleeve. (I later learned he thought her question concerned her chances of seducing him, so he was very worried.) He handed Deborah the coins.

"Think hard on your question and throw."

Kneeling on the rug she clutched the coins, closing her eyes tight. Suddenly she opened them. "Should I shake the coins before throwing them?"

"If you wish."

"I feel I should make an incantation or something at the same time."

"Great. Anything you want. Give it everything you feel."

Holding the coins between her hands, she shook them together and let them fly. "Seven come eleven!"

"Baby needs a new pair of shoes," shouted Tom excitedly.

Shaking with laughter at this unexpected nonsense, we peered down at the coins. Upward on all three were the sides with the three-headed lion figure. "A moving Yin line," Tom said and wrote down the base lines of two hexagrams, one broken, representing the Yin principle, the other unbroken, or the Yang or male principle.

"The Yang and Yin principles," he explained to Deborah before going on, "are two parts of the Universal Principle, and it is by their interaction that Change occurs. The I Ching, which means Book of Changes, visualizes this. Now, the Yang principle represents heaven, male, active, strong, firm...." Deborah was looking at him with very loving eyes. He cleared his throat. "And Yin, the female principle, represents earth, yielding, dark, soft ... warm ... wet...." He went quite red in the face. "Throw the coins, Chickie," he said, turning away.

With less silliness Deborah threw five times more, and Tom wrote down the lines. Because of the moving line where Yin turned into its opposite, Hexagram 48 changed into Hexagram 5. With some apprehension, we turned to the explanations given in the book, finding that number 48 was CHING, A Well.

At first reading, this seemed to tell us nothing at all. Deborah as a well? Perhaps. But what had this to do with her question? We read the comments on the text, which added nothing to our comprehension.

Deborah was unenchanted. "So now I'm an old well with muddy water. "

Deborah took the book in her hands and began studying the page. She grew thoughtful. Was she going to give up waiting to see the Mother? I hoped so.

The comments suggested that a journey at this time would be rewarding. I called Her Ladyship's attention to this. "You have never seen Ceylon," I added. "Miles of beautiful beaches and many historical sites." I did not mention, of course, the dangerous rascals and criminals who inhabit this paradise.

"The superior man will find contentment in feasting and enjoying himself. Christmas is coming, Chickie. Stay here."

Deborah looked displeased. "The only part that answers my question is that part about crossing the Great Sea."

Not knowing then what she meant, Flaminio foolishly pointed out that there was water between the mainland and the island of Ceylon.

She turned to Tom. "Is this supposed to direct your life in general or answer a specific question?"

"Answer a specific question."

"Well, which am I supposed to do? Be inactive and meditate, or cross the Great Sea?"

"Any way it grabs you. Do both. Bide your time here, then cross the sea."

She nodded thoughtfully and sat back in her chair, staring at the ceiling. Then she got up. "Is that it?"

"That's it if you think it is."

She excused herself and went out into the garden. Our two heads turned to look at the notebook lying on the desk. She had written her question in there. We looked at each other and shrugged. Tom opened the book. At the top of one page, scribbled in her awful American handwriting, was the question. Shld I c.s. ? I didn't know what to think. The "c" was surely representing a verb, the "s" a noun. Cross ... sea? But she had written it before consulting the book. "What do you suppose she is asking?" I asked Tom.