e never begin her
valedictory?

She tried again. No one heard her except her friends and teachers on the
stage. Her voice was no louder than a faint whisper.

Miss Tolliver leaned over. "Madge, speak more distinctly," she ordered.

Then the little captain realized that the most humiliating moment of her
whole life had arrived. She had been selected as the valedictorian of her
class, she had been chosen above her beloved Phil because of her gift as
a speaker, yet she would be obliged to return to her seat without having
delivered a line of her address. She would be disgraced forever!

Madge's knees shook. Her lips trembled. Tears swam mistily in her eyes.
She was a lovely picture despite her fright.

At eighteen she was in the first glory of her youth, a tall, slender
girl, with a curious warmth and glow of life. Her lips were deeply
crimson, her hair a soft brown, with red and gold lights in it, and her
eyes were full of the eagerness that foreshadows both happiness and
pain.

Phil and Miss Jenny Ann were exchanging glances of despair--Madge had
broken down, there was no hope for her. Suddenly her face broke into one
of its sunniest smiles. She lifted her head. Without glancing at the
paper she held in her hand she began her address in a clear, penetrating
voice.

CHAPTER II

HOW IT WAS ALL ARRANGED

Madge's valedictory address was almost over. She had spoken of
"Friendship," what it meant to a girl at school and what it must mean to
a woman when the larger and more important difficulties come into her
life. "Schoolgirl friendships are of no small consequence," declaimed
Madge; "the friendships made in youth are the truest, after all!"

Phil listened to her chum's voice, her eyes misty with tears. Only a
half-hour before she and her beloved Madge had come very near to having
the first real quarrel of their lives. Phil turned her gaze from Madge to
glance idly at the arch of flowers above her friend's head. Phil supposed
that she must be dizzy from the heat of the room, or else that she could
not see distinctly because of her tears; the arch seemed to be swaying
lightly from side to side, as though it were blown by the wind. Yet the
room was perfectly still. Phil looked again. She must be wrong. The arch
was built of a framework of wood. It was heavy and she did not believe it
would easily topple down.

Madge was happily unconscious of the wobbling arch. A few more lines and
her speech would be ende