“Anything for the defense?” inquired the judge.

“We waive our defense,” said the stir steerer. He left the room, and luckily I never saw him.

“Defendant held to await the action of the grand jury.”

I was led away.

It was a relief to get into the county jail, away from the bedbugs. It was clean. I was put in a cell with a fine old Mormon farmer, charged with polygamy⁠—unlawful cohabitation, to use the legal phrase. He was well supplied with tobacco and food, from friends outside, which he shared with me. We were confined to the cells all the time, and I made no acquaintances while there. I did not try. I was much discouraged at this turn of things against me, but was still hopeful of getting out and returning to my father.

“You’ve been indicted by the grand jury,” said the jailer one morning, some three weeks later, “and today you go up to the big house.”

Utah then was a territory and all persons indicted were at once transferred to the custody of the United States marshal who, in addition to his other duties, acted as warden of the territorial penitentiary. An hour later I was taken out of my cell and turned over to a big, rawboned man with a worn pistol swinging from a holster on his belt.

“Young feller, I don’t put irons on none of ’em,” he said to me, tapping his gun. “Ef you want ter run, that’s yore business.”

In an hour I was at the penitentiary, where I made friends and incurred obligations that turned my thoughts away from home and sent me back on the road.