St. Malo.
Dearest Mama: We are all here together again except the Brewers and the two Tripps and Ellsworth Grimm. It is very jolly, only I am so worried over Uncle and Miss Clara Emily. Even Mr. Peters cannot keep them apart. Lee took Mr. Peters to his room and talked to him seriously, and offered to make Uncle still more worth his while; but Mr. Peters has been agreeable so long that he doesn't do it well any more. He just looks silly, and Lee says if he was us he'd let Uncle go rip. But of course Lee isn't us, and I know that he can't be expected to know just how we feel. If Uncle John marries Miss Clara Emily, I know no one is going to like it at all.
In Mont-Saint-Michel
We went to Mont-Saint-Michel, and every one but Uncle went up, and he went seven flights up—he says twenty, but I don't believe that there are more than sixteen or seventeen in all. We were ahead, and never knew that he had stopped being behind, and it was so interesting on top that I forgot I had an uncle. There are beautiful halls and cloisters, and then one goes down through all sorts of horrors while the guide tells who lived five years in this hole and who lived twelve years under those steps. You get to have such a contempt for people who were in prison only one or two years over here—as if they ought to be ashamed of only having been in such a short time. There is a ghostly, ghastly museum in Mont-Saint-Michel where the visitors walk through an unlighted gallery and look in at wax victims doing different things in a very thoughtful manner—all but one man who walked on the sand and was overtaken by the tide, and he looks anything but thoughtful. The best was the battle, which was very realistic and must have been very trying to the leaders; for how could they get absorbed in a fight when the tide would drown them if they kept on a minute too long? There was a man who thought he would escape, and dug a way out with his nails, taking a short life-time to the task; and then he found he'd dug in instead of out, and, after letting himself down with a rope, he came to a bottom all covered with skeletons. I can assure you that I was glad we were all together and that Lee had my arm tight, for the scenes were awful, and I grew so sick toward the last that when we came down at the end and found Uncle sitting on the ramparts with Miss Clara Emily, I nearly screamed. They had all come while we were above, and Emily and some men were out walking on the sand. Clara is somewhat better; but I think she is even more sincere than usual this time. In her locket she has some plaster from the wall that she heard through, and she says she sleeps with it pressed to her lips. And I know that Miss Clara Emily is going to do everything in the world to get Uncle, for Emily says she was traveling just with a little hand-satchel, and now she insists on a suit-case. Oh, dear, I don't know what to do; and Lee is tired of the situation, and wants to go yachting, and I want to go with him. It would be so lovely off yachting with Lee; and the yacht is anchored where we can see her from the city walls. Lee is forever pointing to her. He says Mr. Stowell would let him have her for a month, any day.
We passed the Brewers on our way to Mont-Saint-Michel, but they must have seen the Kingsleys and gone back. Mrs. Brewer told me in Vire that they could never meet the Kingsleys again; she said that Mr. Brewer said if he should meet Clara he knew he should explode. I don't think that Mr. Brewer has much heart or he never would have called poor Clara a Yellow Kid; I've known Clara ever since I was a baby, and it never struck me that she looked like that till she told me that Mr. Brewer said so.
We all took the tram-ride to Rocabey yesterday, but one is so afraid that a wave will wash over the car and drench every one with spray that it isn't much fun. The tide is so funny all along this coast, because the coast is so level that a foot of water covers a mile or so, and when a wave starts to come in there's nothing to stop it at all. I don't think that St. Malo is very interesting, but perhaps that is just Uncle and Miss Clara Emily. He sends her violets, and I know it is he, for it couldn't be Mr. Peters or Mr. Stowell, and it wouldn't be Jim Freeman or Scott McCarthy. She wears them pinned on in such a funny way.