And again her face was illuminated by the triumphant expression which
it wore when she returned to Knockers' Llyn with Winnie.
'It was indeed your noble self-sacrifice for Winnie and me that made
the dukkeripen of the Golden Hand come true.'
'It worn't all for you and Winnie, Hal. I ain't a-goin' to let you
think better on me than I desarve. It wur partly for you, and it wur
partly for my dear mammy, and it wur partly for myself. Listen to me,
Hal Aylwin. _When I made Winnie's dukkeripen come true I made my own
dukkeripen come to naught at the same time_. The only way to make a
dukkeripen come to naught is to make another dukkeripen what
conterdicks it come true. That's the only way to master a dukkeripen.
It ain't often that Romanies or Gorgios or anything that lives can
master his own dukkeripen. I've been thinkin' a good deal about sich
things since I took that cuss on me. Night arter night have I laid
awake thinkin' about these 'ere things, and, brother, I believe I
have done what no livin' creatur ever done before--I've mastered my
own dukkeripen. My mammy used to say that the dukkeripen of every
livin' 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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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