Judith stood for a moment enjoying the scene. The sky was still blue, but there were bands of colour in the west and the shadows of the pine trees had lengthened considerably. She drew a deep breath of unconscious enjoyment drinking in the wonderful air that tasted like clear spring water, and then, making sure that both skis were quite straight, she pushed off.
For a moment like a bird she felt herself flying through the air. How glorious! Then quite suddenly came a sense of suffocation and thick darkness. In some way the long curved wings on her feet had tripped her and she had pitched head foremost into a deep snow-bank. Nancy, who saw her disappear, halloed to the boys as she sped to the place where Judith was buried, and they appeared with magical swiftness.
They pulled Judith out—not without difficulty—and wiped the snow off her face.
"Are you hurt?" said Jack anxiously.
Judith struggled to get her breath.
"It's—too—beautiful," she said, without opening her eyes, her mind evidently still on the river view,—"perfectly glorious!"
Jack burst into relieved laughter.
"Judith's a game little thing," he said to his mother later on; "I suppose we shouldn't have left them so soon, but she seemed to get the hang of it very quickly—she slid into that bank as neatly as an arrow—I'm mighty glad she isn't hurt."
Judith could hardly keep her eyes open at the dinner-table, and she was glad enough to accept Mrs. Nairn's suggestion that she go to bed early.