Enumerating pairs of permutations with the same up-down form

For each sequence q = {q_i} = ± 1, i = 1, …, n−1 let N_q = the number of permutations σ of 1, 2, …, n with up-down sequence sgn(σ_i+1 − σ_i) = q_i, i = 1,…, n−1. Clearly Σ_q (N_q/n!) =1 but what is the probability p_n = Σ_q (N_q/n!)² that two random permutations have the same up-down sequence? We show that p_n = (Kⁿ⁻¹1,1) where 1 = 1(x, y) ≡ 1 and Kⁿ⁻¹ is the iterated integral operator with Kφ(x, y) = ∫₀¹∫₀¹ K(x, y; x′, y′)φ(x′, y′) dx′ dy′ on L²0, 1] × 0, 1] where K(x, y; x′, y′) is 1 if (x− x′)(y − y′) > 0 otherwise, and (f, g) = ∫₀¹∫₀¹fg. The eigenexpression of K yeilds p_n ∼ cαⁿ as n → ∞, where c ≈ 1.6, α ≈ 0.55.We also give a recursion formula for a polynomial whose coefficients are the frequencies of all the possible forms.