technicality.

When Bob began to think more clearly, he at first laid this difference
to a personal liking, and was inclined to blame himself for letting his
affections cloud his sense of justice. Baker was companionable, jolly,
but at the same time was shrewd, cold, calculating and unscrupulous in
business. He could be as hard as nails. Welton, on the other hand, while
possessing all of Baker's admirable and robust qualities, had with them
an endearing and honest bigness of purpose, limited only--though
decidedly--by his point of view and the bounds of his practical
education. Baker would steal land without compunction; Welton would take
land illegally without thought of the illegality, only because everybody
else did it the same way.

But should the mere fact of personality make any difference in the
enforcing of laws? That one man was amiable and the other not so amiable
had nothing to do with eternal justice. If Bob were to fulfil his duty
only against those he disliked, and in favour of his friends, he had
indeed slipped back to the old days of henchman politics from which the
nation was slowly struggling. He reared his head at this thought. Surely
he was man enough to sink private affairs in the face of a stern public
duty!

This determined, Bob thought the question settled. After a few minutes,
it returned as full of interrogation points as ever. Leaving Baker and
Welton entirely out of the question, the two cases still drew apart. One
was just, the other unjust. Why? On the answer depended the peace of
Bob's conscience. Of course he would resign rather than be forced to
prosecute Welton. That was understood, and Bob resolutely postponed
contemplation of the necessity. He loved this life, this cause. It
opened out into wider and more beautiful vistas the further he
penetrated into it. He conceived it the only life for which he was
particularly fitted by temperament and inclination. To give it up would
be to cut himself off from all that he cared for most in active life;
and would be to cast him into the drudgery of new and uncongenial lines.
That sacrifice must be made. It's contemplation and complete realization
could wait. But a deeper necessity held Bob, the necessity of resolving
the question of equities which the accident of his personal knowledge of
Welton and Baker had evoked. He had to prove his instincts right or
wrong.

He was not quite ready to submit the matter officially, but he wished
very much