"Sir," said Pete respectfully, for the Tyee was so big and strong besides being a Tyee, which always counts.
"I have given your wife some stuff to make a dress. She was very good to my brother and to Mary," said Quin. "She's a very good little girl."
He nodded and walked on. He wished Pete would get killed on the top of a log, but his face was inscrutable and calm as that of any full-blooded Siwash. Pete was as innocent and as unsuspicious as any child. If he feared anyone it was Spanish Joe, with his guitar and his songs. He went home as pleased as Punch by the condescension of the Boss, and found Jenny laying out dinner.
The trouble came as quick as it could come. It came right there and then, when both were as happy as they could be. Jenny fairly shivered with pleasure to think of the silk she had hidden inside the inner room. Real silk it was and new, not a cast-off rag from Mrs. Alexander, of the Kamloops Hotel. The tulips of the dressing-gown faded clean out of sight: they died down in their monstrous array. She saw the Dress, saw it made up, saw the world admire it: heard the other klootchmen clicking envious admiration. But how was she to account for it to Pete? She had been kissed by Quin, and she knew he liked her, wanted her. The big man flattered her senses, he was a white man, rich and strong. She wouldn't have almost sworn on the Bible that she wouldn't lass him, now that this silk filled earth and heaven for her gaudy little mind. She would have to think how to tell Pete.
So in came Pete in excitement.
"Show me what Mr. Quin give you," he demanded. And her unlucky lie was ready. It fell from her lips before she had a moment to think.
"He give me nothing; why you say that?"
Pete's jaw fell and his eyes shut to a thin line.
"You damned liar, kliminiwhit," he said. "I know."
"It's not true, you dam' liar you'self," said Jenny. "What for you tink the Tyee give me tings? You tink me a cultus klootchman like Indian Annie?"