"Evidently _not_," exclaimed Mr. Potts, who in his younger days had
been somewhat wild, "that cock won't fight!" he continued, using a
figure of speech, derived from the experience of said younger days.
As for the Doctor, he mentally wished the beautiful Mrs. Julia Parkins
in Kamschatka.
"Never have an affair with a _fool_ again, as long as I live!" he
muttered.
"And while you soothed my poor old husband, on that doctrinal point;
you,--you," sobbed Julia, "told me how handsome I was, and what a shame
it was for me, to be jailed up with an old man like that. Yes, you said
_jailed_. And how it was no harm for me to love you, and that it was no
harm for you to love me. And I heard you preach, and you came to the
house, day after day, and,--" poor Julia could not go on for sobbing.
The three gentlemen groaned.
As for Dr. Bulgin, he calmly rose from his seat, and taking the
corkscrew from the tray on the table, proceeded quietly to draw the
cork of a bottle of champagne. This accomplished, he filled a long
necked glass to the brim with foaming Heidsick.
"Jig's up, gentlemen," he said, bowing to the three, as he tossed
off the glass, and regarded them with a smile of matchless
impudence,--"Jig's up!"
"What does he mean by 'jig's up?'" asked Mr. Burns of Mr. Potts, in a
very hollow voice.
"He means," returned Bulgin himself, straightening up, and rubbing his
broad chest with his fat hand, "that the jig is up. You've found me
out. There's no use of lying about it. And now that you have found me
out,--" he paused, filled another glass, and contemplated the three,
over its brim,--"allow me to ask, what do you intend to do?"
He took a sip from the glass. The three were thunderstruck.
"Cool!" exclaimed Mr. Potts, punching the toe of his boot with his cane.
"You _can't_ expose me," continued Bulgin, as he took another sip:
"that would create _scandal_, you know, and hurt the church more than
it would me."
The rich impudence of the Doctor's look, would "have made a cat laugh."
"We _will_ expose you!" cried Watkins, hollowly, with an emphatic
nodding of his nose. "The truth demands it. As long as you are suffered
to prowl about in this way, no man's wife, sister, or daughter is safe."
"No man's wife, sister, or daughter is safe!" echoed Mr. Potts.
"Did I ever tempt _your_ wife, Burns?" coolly asked Bulgin,--Burns
winced, for his wife was remarkably plain.
"Or your sister, Potts?" Potts colored to the eyes; his sister was a
miracle of plainness.
"Or your daughter, Watkins?" Watkins felt the thrust, for his daughter
was as plain as Burns' wife and Potts' sister combined.