Far away in Assam there was a young king called Rattan Rai Ji.
He was still a boy. And his mother had done one thing for him that was better than anything else she could have done. She had not filled his head with rules and rituals. She had put a spark of love for Guru Ji into his heart, and it had caught, and it was burning there all the time.
He had never once seen Guru Ji. He wanted to more than he wanted anything.
So he began to get gifts ready.
Assam is a country full of elephants, and he searched until he found the most beautiful one there was. It was jet black, and on its forehead was a patch as white as ivory, with white lines running all the way down to its feet, so that it looked like a black mountain with rivers of snow coming down it.
Now here is the thing about that boy. A boy who owns an elephant like that usually wants to ride it through the streets so that everybody says, look how grand our king is. He never once thought that. All he thought was: how happy I will be when I see Guru Ji riding it.
He had the elephant dressed in silk and pearls and gold thread. He had trainers come and teach it things. He gathered muslins and brocades and jewellery and weapons, a special table, a gun that could fire five times, and five horses so well kept that a fly could not settle on them.
It took him months.
And one worry kept coming back to him, and he said it out loud to his mother, with tears he was trying to hold in. What if Guru Ji will not take them? People say that in Guru Ji's court a king and a poor man are exactly the same. What if he looks at all this and sees only my pride?
At last they set off, his mother in a palanquin and the young king on his horse, and the whole slow train of gifts behind them. They went by way of Patna, and there he stopped for a long time, going round the town meeting everybody who had known Guru Ji as a child there, listening to every story, so glad he could hardly bear it.
Then, at last, the day came when he was told he would see Guru Ji himself.
The elephant was decorated all over again. Red velvet on its forehead. Gold on the bridles. The five horses beside it. Everything ready.
And at that moment his mother called him inside.
My darling son, she said. Your gifts are wonderful, and they cost a great deal. Be glad the Lord gave you so much that you had something to bring.
But now, she said, be careful. This is the moment to watch yourself, because pride is very quick.
Do not stand there thinking, I brought all this. The minute you think that, it is spoiled.
Pray instead, she said. Say: it is only the Lord's kindness that I am allowed to look at Guru Ji at all. And say: please let my small gifts be accepted.
Think of a garden, she told him. The gardener cuts flowers and hands them to the man who owns the garden. They were his flowers on his bushes the whole time. And still he is pleased when the gardener puts them in his hands.
That is what we are doing, she said. Nothing else.
So the young king went in like that, with nothing in his hands that he thought was his.
And he had barely gone down at Guru Ji's feet when he felt a hand come to rest on his head, and a voice above him said: Get up, King. You are blessed. You are blessed in this world and the other one.
You are Guru Nanak Dev Ji's child.
Then the gifts were carried in, and unwrapped, and set out one after another, and Guru Gobind Singh Ji looked carefully at every single thing, and listened while the whole story of each one was told to him. It took more than an hour and a half, and he did not hurry any of it.