Uniontown is the county seat where Billy Poe is taken from Buell for identification and detention. In the novel, the town marks a transition from the uncertain, personal handling of his case by Bud Harris to the formal process that places Poe in a holding cell and before a lineup.

Setting and Approach

Harris drives Poe south toward Uniontown after Poe has shaved and sat for four sets of mugshots. Rather than taking the direct route, Harris follows a longer crossing of the Mon River: they travel by ferry at Fredericktown, continue west through rolling farmland, and cross the river again before reaching the county seat. Poe initially wonders whether the detour offers a chance to escape, then recognizes it as a last opportunity to see the surrounding landscape before detention. His attention to the changing countryside makes the journey feel less like ordinary transport than a final passage out of familiar territory.

Identification and Detention

Harris does not handcuff Poe during the drive, but at Uniontown he passes the restraints back through the partition and tells Poe to tighten them so it will look as though Harris applied them. Harris then leads him into a large brick building. Poe is placed in a holding cell and later brought into a lineup with five other men of roughly his age and height. One of the men is a police officer who had been in street clothes in the lobby. After the lineup, Poe is returned to the cell; Harris eventually comes back and indicates that the witness identified him quickly. The sequence turns Uniontown from a destination into the place where the case against Poe gains immediate force.

Narrative Significance

The drive’s detour and the lineup create a sharp contrast between private discretion and official identification. Before reaching Uniontown, Harris has made choices about how to handle Poe; at the county seat, the process moves toward formal detention, even as Harris’s small gestures—leaving off handcuffs during the drive and asking Poe to make them look properly applied—retain traces of their personal relationship. Uniontown therefore serves as the threshold where Poe’s uncertain journey ends and his custody begins.