Salad Days

The most desirable thing in life is to have the sense of doing your duty
without the trouble of doing it. Therefore days of preparation are
always delicious days. There is the mingling of repose with all the joys
of activity. To be planning to do things has in it more of triumph than
the actual doing. It carries the irradiating light of hope and purpose,
without the petty pin-prick of detail which comes when reality parodies
ideals.

Dick's first summer at home was a period of delight. He absorbed ideas
and so felt that he was doing something in this city of his birth which
now, in his manhood, came back to him as something new and strange. The
weeks drifted by and he seemed to drift with them, though both mind and
body were alert. All the things he learned and all the things he meant
to do were tripled and quadrupled in interest when he passed them on to
his two counselors-in-chief, Norris, solid and appreciative, Madeline,
even more believing and more sympathizing, but glorified by that charm
of sex which gilds even trifling contact of man and maid, making her
friendship not only gilt but gold.

So he spent his days in prowling about and meeting all sorts and
conditions of men, while Ellery slaved in a dirty and noisy office; but
when Saturday came and the Star went to press at three, Norris, with
the blissful knowledge that there was no Sunday edition, would meet
Percival, stocked with a week's accumulation of experiences. In the
hearts of both would be deep rejoicing as, at week-end after week-end,
they stowed themselves in Dick's motor and betook themselves lakeward,
nominally to go to the Country Club and play golf, but with the
subconsciousness for both that the lake meant Madeline.