the jig is up

alternative jig's up · alternative one's jig is up · alternative one's jig's up · alternative the jig's up

1. AustraliaNew ZealandUSidiomaticUsed to express that a deception, trick, or dishonest scheme has been discovered, signaling the end of the ruse.

   We knew then the jig was up, and it was no grin matter for us.

   1753, The Skipper

   3 more examples

   When I first told 'em how the jig was up with us, that the British were going to have the land, without any fighting about it, I never see fellows so mad before in my life, unless it was Major Eaton at Washington when he sot out to flog Mr. Ingham.

   1833, Seba Smith (as Jack Downing), The life and writings of Major Jack Downing, of Downingville, away down East in the State of Maine, Lilly; Wait; Colman & Holden, page 176

   After I had returned home in the spring of 1893 from Washington, where I saw so many gray-haired men who had held high elective office begging for the crumbs from Cleveland's table, I gave my wife an account of what I observed, and told her that when the jig was up for me I would hasten back to Missouri to begin the practice of law once more and be a man among men.

   1920, Champ Clark, My Quarter Century of American Politics, Harper & brothers, page 96

   The universe works in strange ways: just when you think the jig is up, you get a second chance.

   2007, Mary Newport, in Jerry Newport and Mary Newport, Mozart and the Whale: An Asperger's Love Story, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 248