He felt that he had done well, so far, setting both the mayor and Skinner against the editor, making a tool of the mayor, and inflaming the butcher against the Colonel.

He would have liked to go to the Colonel and set him against the editor and Skinner, but he neither dared nor felt it really necessary.

If Skinner attempted to make the Colonel take back the lung-testers the ill feeling between the two would be sufficiently emphasized, and no doubt the Colonel had sufficient reason, in the publication of the article, to hate the editor.
Horsewhipped! His face reddened as he thought of it, but he was too polite to consider a revenge of fists, which would not lessen the insult of the whipping he had received, but would only add the stigma of attacking an older man.

That he had led the Colonel into the affair, putting him up to it, did not strike him as being any excuse for the Colonel.

He felt that he had done only what he was entitled to do in the pursuit of political leadership.