The "Sunday House" was nearing completion.
It was not a cathedral. It was not even ambitious. Just a clean, elegant structure of red brick and teak, placed deliberately in a quiet grove of sheesham trees—close enough to the rising Officers' Colony to feel familiar, far enough from the village lanes to keep it orderly.
In his study, Jinnah stood over the blueprints with an expression he usually reserved for hostile judges and dishonest witnesses. His irritation, however, was not directed at law or politics.
It was directed at a list.
Candlesticks.Hymn books.Pews.Altar cloth.
He rubbed his temples, as if pressure alone could force Anglican logistics into his skull. He could dismantle a bill in the Assembly. He could negotiate cotton prices like a banker. He could make senior administrators measure their words.
But the interior requirements of a British Sunday service were an alien language.
"Ahmed," he called, without lifting his eyes from the paper. "Ask Dr. Cartwright to join me. And Nurse D'Souza—if the clinic can spare her."
1) The Ecclesiastical Request
When Evelyn entered, she found him staring at a catalogue of brass fixtures with genuine perplexity—the kind a man shows only when the enemy is not malicious, merely absurd.
"You sent for me, Sir?"
"Doctor," Jinnah said, gesturing to the chair. "I require your expertise. Not medical. Cultural."
He slid the catalogue across the desk as though it were evidence in a difficult case.
"The garrison arrives in two weeks. Thirty families. They will require a place of worship. The structure is built, but…" He paused, and in that hesitation was something rare—an open admission of ignorance. "I do not know the liturgy. I need you and Mary to arrange the… aesthetics. The rituals. The order of service. Whatever makes Sunday morning feel like England for them."
Evelyn picked up the catalogue and flipped a page. A small smile formed, half-amused and half-impressed.
"You want us to set up a church, Mr. Jinnah?"
"I want to set up a facility for spiritual maintenance," Jinnah corrected, stiffly precise. "If the officers are praying, they are not drinking. If they are not drinking, they are not causing trouble."
Evelyn leaned back in her chair, the smile sharpening into a tease.
"You are very pragmatic for a man who has recently been canonized."
Jinnah's jaw tightened.
"Please," he said, as if requesting mercy from a nuisance. "Do not start."
2) The Saint's Burden
"I am serious," Evelyn continued, her eyes bright with that particular British mix of mockery and sincerity. "You should see the clinic today. The patients don't just take their medicine anymore. They accept it like… a sacrament."
She lowered her voice, as if confiding a scandal.
"Yesterday, I told an old woman to boil her water. Usually, they argue. They say it wastes wood. This time she bowed her head and said, 'If the Saint's Helper says so, it must be done.' They listen to hygiene instructions like sermons now, Mr. Jinnah—because they consider us the hands of the Data da Vakeel."
Jinnah exhaled cigar smoke with slow annoyance, as though the entire myth-making process were an administrative leak he had not yet found the valve for.
"It is irrational," he muttered. "I tried to tell them I am a sinner. They turned it into a parable."
He stood and moved to the window, staring out at the distant village lights—those scattered points of life that had become, in a few months, a system.
3) The "Devil" in the Head
"Actually," he said softly, still facing the glass, "the devil in my head is giving me the same idea."
Evelyn's smile returned. She had heard the phrase before. To her, it was Jinnah's way of describing his razor-edged intuition—his cold, strategic inner voice that kept him ahead of the British, ahead of feudal lords, ahead of the chaos itself.
She had no idea the "devil" was a man named Bilal, from 2024, sitting somewhere in the back of Jinnah's mind like a spectator with too much commentary.
"Your devil wants you to build a church?" Evelyn asked, amused. "That sounds counterintuitive for a devil."
"This devil is… peculiar," Jinnah said, turning from the window at last. "He tells me that if we strip the myth out of every religion—Christianity, Islam, Hinduism—what remains is social service."
Evelyn blinked. Jinnah's tone had shifted. It was not casual conversation now. It was the cadence of a barrister building a case—premise, example, conclusion.
He began to pace.
"Think about it, Doctor. What did the Prophets do? Did they only chant? No. They established laws for hygiene. They mandated charity for the poor. They set rules for marriage and inheritance to prevent chaos. They taught empathy."
He stopped at his desk, fingers resting lightly on the edge as if grounding himself.
"My devil tells me the Prophets were the original social reformers. Their 'miracles' were often advanced common sense—wrapped in awe, to make it portable."
Evelyn listened, unexpectedly focused. She had seen his competence in administration, his control under pressure. But this was different: Jinnah taking something sacred and dissecting it without contempt—removing the incense, keeping the mechanism.
"That is…" she chose her words carefully, "…a utilitarian view of faith."
"It is the only view that matters for a state," Jinnah replied. "If I want people to follow health protocols, behave with empathy, and uphold the law, I cannot lecture them on civics. I must make them understand these are duties."
Exactly, Bilal whispered in his head. You catch on fast.
Jinnah continued, as if he had heard an approving nod rather than a voice.
"So if building a church makes British officers behave morally—and if visiting a shrine makes villagers boil their water—then I will build the church, and I will visit the shrine."
4) The Praise of the Demon
Evelyn leaned back and studied him for a long second, then shook her head—half in disbelief, half in admiration.
"Well," she said, tapping the catalogue, "I have to say, Mr. Jinnah… I like this devil of yours."
Jinnah's eyebrow rose.
"You do?"
"Yes," she said, firm now. "Most politicians use religion to divide people. Your devil seems to want to use it to clean them up and make them behave. He sounds like a very practical sort of demon."
Did you hear that? Bilal crowed. She likes me. The Angel likes the Devil.
She thinks you are a metaphor for my intellect, Jinnah replied inwardly, flat as a ruler. Do not let it go to your head.
Aloud, Jinnah allowed the smallest concession.
"He is practical," he admitted. "Though he argues too much."
5) The Two Tyrannies
Evelyn's expression changed; the teasing softened into genuine curiosity.
"But tell me," she asked, "most modern thinkers insist on the separation of Church and State. Are you not worried about mixing them?"
"They are correct," Jinnah said at once. "In administration, they must be separate. The priest cannot write the law, and the judge cannot lead the prayer."
He leaned forward, eyes sharpened by conviction rather than anger.
"Church and State can coexist, Doctor. They must. The State manages the body; the Church manages the soul. If they work in parallel, you get civilization."
He tapped the desk once—quiet, controlled emphasis.
"But two tyrannies cannot."
Evelyn frowned. "Two tyrannies?"
"The tyranny of the fanatic who burns books," Jinnah said, voice darkening, "and the tyranny of the godless state that burns people. I intend to have neither in Sandalbar."
He picked up his pen—an unmistakable signal that the philosophical argument was complete and the administrative work was resuming.
"So, Doctor," he said, with dry impatience returning, "will you help me buy the candlesticks? Or must I ask the 'Devil' to choose the altar cloth? He has terrible taste in curtains."
Evelyn laughed, stood, and took the catalogue under her arm as if accepting a battlefield assignment.
"I will handle it, Mr. Jinnah. Leave your devil to strategy. Let Mary and me handle the liturgy. We will make it a proper Anglican setup—Low Church, simple, no fuss. Just like you."
"Good," Jinnah said, already returning to his papers. Then, without looking up: "And Evelyn."
"Yes?"
"Tell the patients," he murmured, "that the Saint insists they boil their water for twenty minutes. Not ten."
Evelyn's smile turned sharp.
"I will deliver the sermon, Sir."
When the door closed, Jinnah finally exhaled—relief, irritation, and resignation blending into one sound.
She thinks I am a genius, he grumbled inwardly. Little does she know I am following the advice of a nagging voice.
Genius is just the ability to listen to good advice, Bilal replied. Now, about those candlesticks—go for brass, not silver. Easier to polish.