noon
He had seen the changes the year had brought . The lake dotted with sinister gray craft . Dog tents in Grant Park , sprung up overnight like brown mushrooms . Men -- mere boys , most of them -- awkward in their workaday clothes of office and shop , drilling , wheeling , marching at the noon hour . And parades , and parades , and parades . At first Jock , and , in fact , the entire office staff -- heads of departments , writers , secretaries , stenographers , office boys -- would suspend business and crowd to the windows to see the pageant pass in the street below . Stirring music , khaki columns , flags , pennants , horses , bugles .