n' thing comes true at last. "Is there anythink in the whole
world," she would say, "more crafty nor one o' those old broad-finned
trouts in Knockers' Llyn? But that trout's got his dukkeripen, an' it
comes true at last. All day long he's p'raps bin a-flashin' his fins
an' a-twiddlin' his tail round an' round the may-fly or the brandlin'
worrum, though he knows all about the hook; but all at wonst comes
the time o' the bitin', and that's the time o' the dukkeripen, when
every fish in the brook, whether he's hungry or not, begins to bite,
an' then up comes old red-spots, an' grabs at the bait because he
_must_ grab, an' swallows it because he _must_ swallow it; an'
there's a hend of old red-spots jist as sure as if he didn't know
there wur a hook in the bait." That's what my mammy used to say. But
there wur one as could, and did, master her own dukkeripen--Shuri
Lovell's little Sinfi.'

'You have mastered your dukkeripen, Sinfi?' 'Yes, I've mastered
mine,' she said, with the same look of triumph on her face--'I swore
I'd master my dukkeripen, brother, an' I done it. I said to myself
the dukkeripen is strong, but a Romany chi may be stronger still if
she keeps a-sayin' to herself "I WILL master it; I WILL, I WILL."'

'Then that explains something I have often noticed, Sinfi. I have
often seen your lips move and nothing has come from them but a
whisper, "I will, I will, I will."'

'Ah, you've noticed that, have you? Well then, _now_ you know what
it meant.'

'But, Sinfi, you have not told me what your dukkeripen is. You have
often alluded to it, but you have never allowed me even to guess what
it is.'

Sinfi's face beamed with pride of triumph.

'You never guessed it? No, you never could guess it. An' months an'
months have we lived together an' you heard me whisper "I will, I
will," an' you never guessed what them words meant. Lucky for you, my
fine Gorgio, that you didn't guess it,' she said, in an altered tone.

'Why?'

''Cos if you had a-guessed it you'd ha' cotch'd a left-hand body-blow
that 'ud most like ha' killed you. That's what you'd ha' cotch'd. But
now as we're a-goin' to part for ever I'll tell you.'

'Part for ever, Sinfi?'

'Yis, an' that's why I'm goin' to tell you what my dukkeripen wur.
Many's the time as you've asked me how it was that, for all that you
and I was pals, I hate the Gorgios in a general way as much as Rhona
Boswell likes 'em. I used to like the Gorgios wonst as well as ever
Rh