“I’m sure I don’t know,” Ruth Fielding said. “She’s going on this boat with us, I guess. Maybe we can get acquainted with her,” and she laughed.
“Excuse me!” returned Helen. “I don’t think I care to. Oh, look!”
The girl in question—who was odd looking, indeed—had been paying the cabman who had brought her to the head of the dock. The dock was on West Street, New York City, and the chums from Cheslow and the Red Mill had never been in the metropolis before. So they were naturally observant of everything and everybody about them.
The strange girl, after paying her fare, started to thrust her purse into the shabby handbag she carried. Just then one of the colored porters hurried forward and took up the suitcase that the girl had set down on the ground at her feet when she stepped from the cab.
“Right dis way, miss,” said the porter politely, and started off with the suitcase.
“Hey! what are you doing?” demanded the girl in a sharp and shrill voice; and she seized the handle of the bag before the porter had taken more than a step.
She grabbed it so savagely and gave it such a determined jerk, that the porter was swung about and almost thrown to the ground before he could let go of the handle.
“I’ll ‘tend to my own bag,” said this vigorous young person, and strode away down the dock, leaving the porter amazed and the bystanders much amused.
“My goodness!” gasped the negro, when he got his breath. “Dat gal is as strong as a ox—sho’ is! I nebber seed her like. She don’t need no he’p, she don’t.”
“Let him take our bags—poor fellow,” said Helen, turning around after paying their own driver. “Wasn’t that girl rude?”