"How did 'e take it, pore dear?" gulped the housemaid.
"Like he's took everythink—that is, up to the present moment," admitted Tait. "But this is about the last straw."
The housemaid dissolved in tears.
"He'll get another young lady," said the cook confidently. "And him so 'andsome an' so clever, an' with such heaps of carriage-swells for patients."
Tait shook his prim, respectable head.
"The swells'll show their tongues to another man now, my gal, who 'asn't the dirt of the Old Bailey on his coat-sleeve. Whistle for patients now, that's what the doctor may. Why, every one of 'em has paid their bills, and them that haven't have asked for their accounts to be sent in. And it's 'Lady So-and-so presents her compliments,' instead of 'Dear Dr. Saxham.' Done for, he is, at least as far as the West End's concerned.... Mind, I don't set up to be infallible, but experience justifies a certain amount of cocksureness, and what I say is—Done for! Best he can do is—sell the practice, and lease, and plate, and pictures, furniture, and so on, for whatever he can get—the movables would have provoked spirited biddin' at auction if the verdict had been Guilty, but, under the circumstances, they won't bring a twentieth part of their valoo—and go Abroad." Tait's gesture was large and vague.
"Foreign parts. Pore dear, it do seem cruel!" sighed the cook.
"And 'is young lady false to 'im, and all. I wonder he don't do away with hisself," sobbed the housemaid. "I do, reely!"
"With all them wicked knives and deadly bottles handy," added the cook.
"Not him!" said Tait. "I'm ready to lay any man the sporting odd against him committing sooicide. He's not the sort. Lord! what was that?"