It develops that Upton Sinclair only served two of his three days' sentence, after all. He was on a hunger strike, and after he had gone unfed for two days, his wife came and paid the rest of his fine and forced him out of jail. Wait till they have been married a little longer, and perhaps she will let him serve three years if he wants to do it.
I enquire among friends and learn that the general impression
is that I declared a "hunger-strike," and couldn't stick
it out, and let my wife come to my rescue. Again the newspapers!
The truth is that I was as comfortable as any man
ought to ask to be in jail; I had a cell to myself, and it was
clean, and near a window, and I was allowed to have my mail,
and all the books I wanted, and visitors at reasonable hours.
But I wanted to appeal from that stupid decision; and in order
to appeal, the lawyers explained, I must have something to
appeal for. I couldn't appeal for the time I spent in jail, for
no court could restore that to me. I had to pay some money—one
dollar at the least; and having paid this, I had to come
out, whether I would or no. So the newspapers had a chance
to report that Upton Sinclair, who had written a book telling
how he had fasted for ten or twelve days, had been unable to
stick out a three-day "hunger-strike"!
