Amy was stunned. Conflicting thoughts rushed through her mind. Had Muttammal been kidnapped by her father’s family? Was she already married? Or had she run away? Had someone in the Dohnavur family helped her? And what did this mean for Amy and the rest of the girls? The judge was sure to think Amy had arranged for Muttammal to go into hiding. He could find her in contempt of court and throw her in jail. That could mean the end of the Dohnavur family. Amy hurried back to Dohnavur as fast as she could to find out what had happened to Muttammal.
She questioned everyone, but no one seemed to know anything about Muttammal’s disappearance. Ponnammal had seen her go to bed in the evening, but when Muttammal didn’t show up for her chores the following morning, Frances Beath had gone to find her. But Muttammal wasn’t in her room, and not a single thing of hers had been taken or disturbed. Her bed roll was unwrapped, which suggested she had slept there. Beyond that, Amy could learn nothing more. She was sure no one was lying to her, but she was also sure Muttammal couldn’t have disappeared the way she did on her own. It was a mystery.
Amy had plenty of other things besides the mystery to think about. Many people had followed the case of Muttammal, and now that the girl was missing there was a public outcry against Amy and her work. Amy turned to another English lawyer to review the case for her. His advice to Amy was to the point: “I advise you to disappear with all your children and cover your tracks. If you cannot do that, I do not know what else you could do to save them all, except faith.”
Amy shuddered. She had spoken up for Muttammal, and now she was in danger of losing her whole family and ending up in a Madras jail. Yet she couldn’t forget the feeling of joy that had flooded her when she heard the verdict. Somehow she knew that God would work things out. As it was, she had no other choice but to hold on to her faith. There was no way an English Amma and more than a hundred girls could hide themselves anywhere in India, even if they wanted to!
Amy and the family prayed about the situation every day. They prayed for Muttammal. They asked that she would be kept safe wherever she was, and they prayed that no court case would be filed against Amy because of Muttammal’s disappearance. And none was filed. Once Muttammal was gone, her father’s family and her mother seemed to lose interest in her, and the whole matter of where she had gone or who had taken her was forgotten. Amy supposed that the families were too busy fighting over the inheritance Muttammal had left behind to care about where she might be.
Amy was still left with a huge legal bill, though. Her own lawyer had donated his time, but Muttammal’s mother’s lawyer had cost a great deal of money, money Amy didn’t have. The last thing Amy needed was to be held in contempt of court for refusing to pay the mother’s legal bills in addition to “losing” Muttammal. Just in the nick of time, an anonymous donation arrived at Dohnavur that would cover the legal bills. It was the exact amount needed, right down to the last rupee. Amy was delighted; she knew that God still had His hand on the whole situation.
It was not until October 1911, seven long months after Muttammal had disappeared, that Amy received a letter postmarked from Kwangsi Province in China. Amy tore the envelope open and began to read. The letter was written in Muttammal’s neat handwriting and told an almost unbelievable story. The night they had heard the judge’s verdict, Muttammal had gone to bed as usual. During the night she had been awakened by Mabel Beath, the visiting sister of Frances. Mabel had taken Muttammal to her room and dressed her as a Muslim boy. Then Mabel had taken her outside the compound and told her to wait. Soon after, a bullock cart lumbered by, and Muttammal was beckoned to climb aboard. Not knowing what else to do, she had obeyed. The driver of the bullock cart turned out to be a Christian from a nearby mission. He had handed Muttammal to another Christian, and so it had gone, passing her from one Christian to another until she had arrived in Colombo, Ceylon. There an Englishman escorted her to Malaya, Singapore, and then to Hong Kong. From there they traveled by junk six hundred miles up the West River to the town of Nanning in Kwangsi Province. In Nanning, Muttammal was delivered to the home of an American missionary couple, Dr. and Mrs. Clift, with whom Muttammal was finally safe and happy.
Amy lay down the letter and smiled. Joy flooded over her with the knowledge that her “daughter” was safe. She wiped the tears of joy from her eyes as she tried to imagine all the Christian strangers who had spent time and money to escort a girl they had never met before on an amazing journey. She thanked God for faithfully watching over one young Indian girl who had put her faith in Him.
Amy tucked the letter into her sari and went to find Iyer Walker, who had been there to support her through all the ups and downs of the custody case. She wanted him to be the first to know the good news about Muttammal.
Amy would not have Iyer Walker to lean on for much longer. In August 1912, he was preaching in a series of meetings at Masulipatam. On August 24, Amy received two telegrams. The first, which had been delayed for two days, said that Thomas (Iyer) Walker was dangerously ill. The second bore the message, “Revelation 22:4.” Amy reached for her worn Bible and flipped to the last page. She scanned down to the verse “And his servants shall serve him, and they shall see his face.” Amy sat for a long time after reading the verse. It could mean only one thing: Her dear friend who had taught her the Tamil language and supported her through all the trials and tribulations of starting the Starry Cluster and then the family at Dohnavur was dead. He was fifty-two years old when he died, and the news of his death left Amy in a daze. It was so difficult to believe that the healthy man who had left just a week before was dead. As the week went on, Amy heard that Iyer Walker had died of food poisoning. She also had the heartbreaking task of contacting his wife, who was back in England and still very sick.
For a few days, it seemed as though grief might overcome Amy. Iyer Walker had been like a big brother to her, and news of his death had come several weeks after news of the death of her other special friend in India, Mrs. Hopwood, in Ooty. Amy had always gathered a team around her for support and encouragement, but now she was on her own. How would she cope without these special people?
The women who worked with Amy were concerned for her. Ponnammal tried to help. “It is very difficult to see how this is for the best,” she told Amy.
Amy replied, “It is not difficult to see how this is for the best; it is impossible. But we are asked to walk not by sight but by faith, and only faith can allow us to let Iyer Walker go without bitterness.”
Amy prayed for the strength to go on, and within days of Iyer Walker’s death, two new helpers arrived to work alongside her. While they could never fill the gap left by Iyer Walker, they were very helpful. They were two sisters, Edith and Agnes Naish, who had both been missionaries in India for many years. As soon as they had heard of Iyer Walker’s death, they had given up their own plans and rushed to help Amy. Both sisters fit into the family perfectly, and Agnes Naish relieved Amy of the huge burden of running the school for the girls.
Arul Dasan, Arulai’s cousin who as a boy had been beaten for listening to the gospel message, had been Iyer Walker’s assistant for many years. Following Iyer Walker’s death, Arul Dasan offered to help Amy in any way he could. With enormous relief, Amy gladly handed over charge of all the building work to him. This involved Arul Dasan’s supervising the maintenance of the existing buildings and the planning of new ones. The family was still growing fast, and one hundred forty people were now living with the family, so there was always some kind of building in progress.
Within a year of Iyer Walker’s death, Ponnammal became sick, and Amy took her to Nagercoil for treatment. It turned out she had cancer, and two operations were performed to try to get rid of it. Amy stayed with Ponnammal for two months while she recovered. Finally, the doctors said that Ponnammal was well enough to make the journey back to Dohnavur.
Soon after arriving back at Dohnavur, Amy received more bad news. On July 14, 1913, back in England, her mother had died. Again Amy stopped to mourn. But the Dohnavur family was still growing, and Amy threw herself into the work, trying to forget all the tragedy that had surrounded her during the previous year. But it wasn’t long before another shadow fell. Ponnammal’s cancer returned, and on August 26, 1915, she too died and was buried in God’s garden at Dohnavur.
It was a difficult and lonely time for Amy. Ponnammal had been with her from the beginning of the Starry Cluster. She was the one Amy had left in charge of the family when she was away. And just as she had with Iyer Walker, she had come to rely on Ponnammal, but now Ponnammal was no longer there. And just as it had been for her after Iyer Walker’s death, Amy had to rely on her faith to go on without bitterness.
As before, Amy threw herself into the work, and the joy of being Amma to so many happy little children rescued from Hindu temples and other desperate situations soon helped Amy to press on after the deaths of so many of the people close to her.
Sometimes Amy had dreams that she learned to pay attention to. In one of her dreams she had seen Muttammal and Arul Dasan being married in a wedding ceremony in Ceylon. The dream was very vivid, filled with little details, like their being married in the Galle Face Church in Colombo and neither Amy nor the Clifts being present. Amy didn’t say anything about it for some time, but finally she shared the dream with Arulai. Much to Amy’s surprise, Arulai smiled widely. “I have been praying that Arul Dasan and Muttammal would get married for over a year now,” she told Amy with great excitement.
Amy asked Arul Dasan what he thought about the idea of marrying Muttammal, and he was very pleased with it. So he and Muttammal began to write to each other, and soon they were engaged. It was thought that Arul Dasan would travel to China for the wedding, but in 1917 the world was at war, and it was unsafe for him to travel all that way. Besides, Dr. and Mrs. Clift were leaving China, and it seemed more sensible for them to take Muttammal as far as Ceylon. The Clifts, though, were in a hurry to get home and were unable to wait in Ceylon for Arul Dasan to arrive for the wedding. So Arul Dasan and Muttammal were married in Galle Face Church in Colombo, Ceylon, without the Clifts or Amy present, just as Amy had dreamed. The newlyweds returned to Dohnavur and set up a home in the compound, where they served together for the rest of their lives. Of course, Amy had a wonderful reunion with Muttammal on her return.
Chapter 17
She Is a He!
A bandy creaked and rumbled its way down the road towards the compound at Dohnavur. Some of the older girls planting rice in one of the outer fields were the first to see it. They rushed to tell Amy that visitors were on their way. By the time the bandy had stopped outside the bungalow, a crowd had gathered to greet it. An old woman climbed wearily from the back of the wagon. She reached in and gently picked up a bundle, which she silently handed to Amy. Amy peeped inside. There lay a little baby, who opened her eyes long enough to see Amy, smile, and then snuggle into her. Amy handed the baby to Mabel Wade, one of her longtime helpers, and invited the old woman in for a cup of tea.
Five minutes later, Mabel Wade came hurrying up the steps and into the bungalow. She was breathless with her discovery. When she had gone to change the baby’s wet diaper, she had discovered “she” was actually a “he”! News quickly buzzed around the family that a baby boy had been given to them. They all asked the same question: Could they keep him?
