The royal party of five shuffled along on their wooden footgear till they came to a long dip with a gentle rise at the end of it. Karl was the first to essay the descent. With knees slightly bent, one foot slightly in front of the other, his burly body noticeably inclined forward, he started on his downward course. For a second or two he moved slowly. Then the pace increased till he was travelling at a sharp speed; then, as the momentum grew, and the angle of the hillside sharpened, he fairly flew through the air in the swift, smooth rush that brings joy to the heart of the ski-runner. At the bottom he got into some soft snow, and after a fruitless struggle with the laws of gravity, the royal equipoise was overcome, and Karl lay prone and buried in the gleaming crystals. A roar of delight burst from his companions above, and a ski-shod foot was waved answeringly in the air in plaintive rebuke at their merriment. Mrs. Saunders was the next to come down. With perfect balance,--relying not at all on her guiding stick,--she swept down the mountain-side like a Valkyrie. With grey eyes shining with pleasure, wisps of fair hair streaming from under her woollen beret, she seemed the embodiment of graceful and athletic young womanhood. Her course was taking her direct on to the prostrate monarch, but at the critical moment she swung round with a superb Telemark turn, and halted to watch Karl's desperate efforts to regain an upright position. The others descended in turn with varying elegance but without serious mishap, Von Hügelweiler bringing up the rear and nearly injuring his sovereign whom he had sworn so solemnly to defend. Onward they went again, shuffling along levels, gliding down descents, mounting laboriously sideways, like crabs, when it was necessary to reach higher ground. In the pleasurable absorption of their sport they wandered far, ever gaining fresh joys of swift descent or harmless fall, and winning fresh views of plain and wood and mountain. "There go the Americans," said the King to Mrs. Saunders. "They have been travelling parallel to us." The King's party had collected under a mutual desire for rest, by a crop of boulders which broke through the level surface of the snows. "Parallel to us," agreed Meyer, mopping his humid face, "but I notice that they always manœuvre for the upper ground." The King frowned at the General's speech. He was enjoying the morning's relaxation from his usual worries, and Meyer's words,--if they had any meaning at all,--suggested personal danger to himself and his friends. "They are excellent ski-runners," said Mrs. Saunders, watching them as they moved rapidly to a point of the hill above them. But Meyer was whispering something in the King's ear, and a vague sense of apprehension had taken the party. Karl nodded, as one convinced against his will, and spoke briefly to the company.