Whatever ebbing of fervor from his daily task Banneker might feel, his public was conscious of no change for the worse.  Letters of commendation, objection, denunciation, and hysteria, most convincing evidence of an editor’s sway over the public mind, increased weekly.  So, also, did the circulation of The Patriot, and its advertising revenue.  Its course in the garment strike had satisfied the heavy local advertisers of its responsibility and repentance for sins past; they testified, by material support, to their appreciation.  Banneker’s strongly pro-labor editorials they read with the mental commentary that probably The Patriot had to do that kind of thing to hold its circulation; but it could be depended upon to be “right” when the pinch came.  Marrineal would see to that.

Since the episode of the killed proof, Marrineal had pursued a hands-off policy with regard to the editorial page.  The labor editorials suited him admirably.  They were daily winning back to the paper the support of Marrineal’s pet “common people” who had been alienated by its course in the strike, for McClintick and other leaders had been sedulously spreading the story of the rejected strikers’ advertisement.  But, it appeared, Marrineal’s estimate of the public’s memory was correct:  “They never remember.”  Banneker’s skillful and vehement preachments against Wall Street, money domination of the masses, and the like, went far to wipe out the inherent anti-labor record of the paper and its owner.  Hardly a day passed that some working-man’s union or club did not pass resolutions of confidence and esteem for Tertius C. Marrineal and The Patriot.  It amused Marrineal almost as much as it gratified him.  As a political asset it was invaluable.  His one cause of complaint against the editorial page was that it would not attack Judge Enderby, except on general political or economic principles.  And the forte of The Patriot in attack did not consist in polite and amenable forensics.  Its readers were accustomed to the methods of the prize-ring rather than the debating platform.  However, Marrineal made up for his editorial writer’s lukewarmness, by the vigor of his own attacks upon Enderby.  For, by early summer, it became evident that the nomination (and probable election) lay between these two opponents.  Enderby was organizing a strong campaign.  So competent and unbiased an observer of political events as Russell Edmonds, now on The Sphere, believed that Marrineal would be beaten.  Shrewd, notwithstanding his egotism, Marrineal entertained a growing dread of this outcome himself.  Through roundabout channels, he let his chief editorial writer understand that, when the final onset was timed, The Patriot’s editorial page would be expected to lead the charge with the “spear that knows no brother.”  Banneker would appreciate that his own interests, almost as much as his chief’s, were committed to the overthrow of Willis Enderby.

It was not a happy time for the Editor of The Patriot.