"I am well served," said Karl. "Herr Saunders here has developed into a student of minor tactics, and I fancy would handle a brigade as well as a Moltke or a Kuroki." At this moment they reached the point of the path where it crosses the bob-sleigh run, and the races being over and the track closed, a wooden plank had been laid across the glassy surface to afford secure foothold. The men halted to allow the ladies,--Mrs. Saunders and Frau Generalin von Bilderbaum,--to pass first. But the latter,--a lady, as the reader knows, of somewhat egregious proportions,--was not gifted by nature with a rapid gait through trampled snow. Holding high her green skirt, and planting her cumbrous snow-boots with deliberate precision, she advanced puffing and panting like a mountain engine in a snow-drift. Before, however, she had come up with the others, a strange man accosted the royal party from the opposite direction. The individual in question was wearing skis, and looked fatigued and travel-stained, as though he had come fast and far. A black slouch hat was pressed over his forehead, and it was not till he was quite close that Karl and his companions recognised the features as those of Von Hügelweiler. The Captain's salutation was as abrupt as his appearance. "Hail! King of half a country," he said. Quietly, swiftly, and without ostentation, Saunders and Meyer covered the newcomer with their revolvers. "Hands up when you speak to his Majesty," said the latter. Von Hügelweiler dropped his ski-ing pole and held up his hands. "I have a weapon in my breast," he said, "but it is not for any here." Meyer quietly inserted his hand into the Captain's breast pocket, and drew out a revolver. It was of the Grimland army pattern, and loaded in all its chambers. He swiftly extracted the cartridges and transferred them to his own person, and then,--having satisfied himself that the Captain had no further munitions of war,--replaced the unloaded weapon in its original position. "Now you may talk without the inconvenience of holding your hands in that fatiguing posture," he said. "What is it?" "I come from Weidenbruck," said Von Hügelweiler, "and I bring news. The day before yesterday an expedition left the capital for Weissheim." Meyer nodded. "That is so," he agreed; "we get to know things, even in this charmingly remote district. Still, details are always agreeable. What does the force consist of?" "The whole brigade of Guards, two battalions of Guides, and the Kurdeburg Sharpshooters." "They do me honour," said the King. "But they will find the railway somewhat disorganised. You see, we have dynamited the principal viaducts, to say nothing of the two-mile tunnel under the Kahberg--and these things are not easy to repair when the snow is down." "The railway is open as far as Eselbruck," the Captain returned, "and from thence they will come over the passes on skis. They will come quicker than they would in the summer."