To face p. 230.
It may be said that from that point to Zermatt the run was practically continuous. No obstacle of any sort ever came to interfere with the downward flight. Whenever the party came to a stop, it did so for its own pleasure and convenience. After the rush down the sides of the Stockjé came the run down the Glacier de Zmutt, with the icefalls of the Matterhorn glacier on the right. Fragments of ice studded the snow surface, and the ski occasionally grated against them. On the moraine, where in summer the surface is stony and the climber’s brow wet with perspiration, we slid along as borne on by wings, rushing through the air. When we reached the Staffelalp the sun was beginning to set. Over the tops of the arolla pines stood forth in a mighty blaze many friends visited of old—the Rimpfischhorn, the Strahlhorn, the Allalinhorn, the Alphubel; the beautiful mouldings of the Findelen glacier were bathed in rays of purple fire. On approaching Zermatt the snow proved heavy and deep. The ski got buried in it and shovelled along masses of it, somewhat delaying the running. Zermatt was reached by five o’clock at night.
The village was in a hubbub, and we arrived in the nick of time to ring the necks of I do not know how many birds of ill omen ready to take their flight. The Bourg St. Pierre dunderheads had had six days in which to rouse the journalists. They had stuffed them with fusty words of ignorant wisdom. Reporters had telegraphed and telephoned, to make sure of their quarry. A column of guides had been warned by the head of the Zermatt relief station to be in readiness. They were to leave on the next morning for the scene of the expected disaster.
They might do so yet, for all we cared. By looking about carefully they might detect the tip of one of Mr. Kurz’s ski, which had snapped off against a stone, at the moment when, entering the village at a quick pace, he had suddenly come upon a milkmaid with her pail balanced on her head. There was nothing for it but to go gallantly to the wall. This was more courtesy than the ski could stand. Its point came off, and this the rescue party might bring back as a trophy.
Joking apart, Zermatt gave us a grand reception, seasoned with steaming bowls of hot red wine and cinnamon.
Thus was accomplished the first successful ski-run from Bourg St. Pierre to Zermatt. Luck was good throughout; indeed, if an attempt to ascend the Dent Blanche on a Friday and on the thirteenth day of the month could not break the weather, nothing would.
The Crettex brothers went back by rail to Orsières. Louis Theytaz got out of the train at Sierre. He returned to his avocations at Zinal, looking with well-founded confidence to his next engagement, a few days hence, with Mr. Moore.
The Crettex’ had no sooner reached home than a telegram reached them from my friend Dr. König of Geneva, one of the pioneers of the new mountaineering school, enjoining Maurice to expect him at once for a repetition of the successful expedition, news of which had meanwhile been carried to Geneva.
Dr. König and Maurice found our ski track generally undisturbed, but the wind and sun had done their work upon the fresh snow, hardening it and covering it with the usual icy film. The running was fast and uncertain, for want of side support for the ski blades. On the way they climbed the Grand Combin, as I had done in 1907. Imitation by such a distinguished mountaineer was the most flattering form of appreciation I could look for. I met him some time after at our Geneva Ski Club, when he observed that he wondered not so much at what my party had accomplished—in which he was quite right, as I proved by producing the table of our very easy hours—as at the bold practical thought that had inspired and helped us.