In the third section of In Cold Blood, There is a chapter in which Perry confesses is very long and detailed. In some ways, it is the climax of the novel. I found it interesting that it is told in the present tense, while the rest of the book is recounted in the past tense. This temporal shift highlights the significance of the chapter. The beginning of the next chapter is in the present tense; it simply describes how cats constantly prowl the main street in Garden City.

The confession is a climax represents the end of the mystery and chase that occupies the police for most of the novel. Throughout, it is clear to the reader that Dick and Perry killed the Clutter family, but the details are unclear. Now they are revealed. The motive is also revealed: They were hoping to find a safe full of money. It is a robbery gone wrong. Later, Perry will change his story somewhat, admitting that it was he who actually killed each of the Clutters. But, for the most part, all the mysteries are solved, and all that remains is the slow and inevitable approach of the execution.

In the third section of In Cold Blood, the reader wants to sympathize with Alvin Dewey's family. Alvin Dewey, or Al, is the head K.B.I. agent investigating the Clutter murders. He and his family are on edge. There phones are ringing non-stop, 24/7. The people are calling for three different reasons: 1. they want to tell Dewey their theory about who killed them and why they did it,
2. They want to "confess" to the murders and turn themselves in so they can get the reward money, or 3. its a fellow K.B.I. agent reporting on leads or evidence that they found out about the murderers. Either way, the Dewey household is in chaos. When he got home in the beginning of the section, his wife saw him and "launched into an account of household upsets. The family cat had attacked the dog across the street, seriously damaging one of its eyes. And Paul, their nine-year-old, had fallen out of the tree. And then their twelve-year-old, Dewey's namesake, had gone into the yard to burn rubbish and started a blaze that threatened the neighborhood"(163). The Dewey family was a mess, everyone on the brink. All Alvin Dewey wanted was to catch the murderers so he could sleep at night, and come home to a wife who told of her kids good, not bad, deeds. One of his fellow agents even said,"That's what I want for Christmas. All I want. To wrap this up. Wrap it up and sleep till New Year's. Wouldn't that be one hell of a present?"(198). This murder has everyone on edge.

I agree with Katelyn, in the fact that Capote basically re-introduces Perry. The way Capote wrote about Perry in the second section, the 3 letters and the memories, Capote wanted the reader to connect with Perry. The way he wrote it, he wanted the reader to see Perry as an innocent, persuadable man who has had one of the worst childhoods. But now, in section 3, Perry is presented as the type of guy who has problems, with himself and pretty much everyone else. His only sister, Barbara, nicknamed Bobo, is scared to death of him. She even moved, from Denver to San Francisco, because she was afraid he would find her and her family and kill them. She was afraid he would kill her. The last time she ever saw him was at her old home in Denver. Apparently Perry had to much to drink, and pushed her against the wall. He yelled at her, saying, "No, Bobo, I'm talking. Shut up, or I will throw you in the river...I hate you, all of you-Dad and everybody"(185). Just the fact that Bobo would travel all the way to the west coast just to get away from her brother is enough to say Perry is a mad man; but the fact that he threatened to kill her is more than enough for the reader's opinion to change about Perry. Perry has had a troubled life; but he has an internal problem that Capote shows in his writing. The way Capote describes Perry in the third section can allow the reader to see the evil side of Perry, the one that murdered an innocent Kansas family of four.

In this 3rd section of the book, as they begin to pursue the killer more heavily, everyone seems to be even more paranoid. The towns people seem to stay the same but the inspectors and, even Dick and Perry (mostly Perry), begin to be scared. When Dewey tells his wife the news, they became very excited in that they are very close to catching the killer, however you know that Dewey is a bit unnerved from this fact. He begins to get closer and closer to finding Dick and Perry and he starts to be constantly on his toes. This comes up especially before Nye calls to tell him the news about Dick writing a bunch of checks in Kansas City which brought them even closer to catching them. He has the nightmare about seeing the killers and chasing them down. It shows that all he could think about was the case and that he had a severely heightened state of awareness and paranoia from it. On the other side of the ordeal, Perry becomes incredibly nervous about being caught. He feels guilty and he knows that he committed a very serious crime and was being very heavily pursued by police. When they get to Kansas City all he can think about is the horrifying vision of police. The whole situation puts him on edge and he becomes even more paranoid than the people that are afraid of him and the people that want to catch him, like Dewey. In this section, Capote uses these factors of, specifically, Dewey and Perry to further heighten the mood of paranoia in the story. The fact that everyone else in the book is still on edge after all this time and that Capote continues to emphasize this fact shows that this was a very serious situation to the people around the killing, and further even makes the reader a little on edge himself.

As I read Section 3, I find myself second-guessing Perry. In section two, I greatly sympathized with him because of the trauma he encountered as a child. However, Capote re-introduces his sister in Section 3. What she has to say about Perry causes me to think differently towards him than I did earlier in the book. This is because what she says about him easily fits Perry. Mainly, she says that he can be deceiving. His own sister admits that she is fearful of Perry. She says, "But I am afraid of him. I always have been. He can seem so warm-hearted and sympathetic. Gentle. He cries so easily. Sometimes music sets him off, and when he was a little boy, he used to cry because he thought a sunset was so beautiful...Oh, he can fool you. He can make you feel sorry for him" (182). And this is exactly what has been done so far. The reader knows Perry to be sensitive, low-key, and pressured into the crime he committed. But by hearing from his sister, someone who has grown up with him, say she is afraid of him and say that he is a good actor, causes us as the readers to second guess our impression of Perry. Maybe he is tricking us, or Capote, into thinking he was the victim and was subject to committing a crime that wasn't really his fault. She also says, "The rights of other people mean nothing to Perry. He has no respect for anyone" (181). Again, this quote plays with the readers mind. We have believed thus far that Perry is a decent individual, but we are introduced to a different opinion that is convincing.

Nurture vs Nature

Through Perry and Dick, Capote illustrates the compelling theories of nature and nurture, when looking at human beings. Nature, meaning in basics, that a person acts the way they do so because it is the way they are programmed to act. Nurture simply means that a person is a way they are because of the way they have been brought up and their surroundings. I would argue that Dick is an example for the nature theory. He was raised well, and seemed to have a fairly good child hood. His parents describe him, "That boy has plenty of good inside him. If ever you seen him on a football field, if ever you seen him play with his children, you wouldn't doubt me" (167). No one would have guessed Dick had a violent nature. His father continues to describe his son, "An outstanding athlete - always first team at school. Basketball, baseball, football! Dick was always the star player. A pretty good student too, with A marks in several subjects" (166). Again, Dick exemplifies the 'perfect kid'. He was talented, and obviously loved by his parents. The same cannot be said about Perry, however. Who, as we already discovered, lived a troubled childhood. He was constantly tormented and faced many challenges. Perry suffered through abuse, spent time in orphanages, and had an unstable life at home. In addition to this, he was not given the privilege of education for most of his life. These aspects, Dick lived without. Therefore, we can hold the past (Upbringing) of Perry responsible for the way he acts; thus proving the Nurture theory.

'Sympathy'

As I have blogged about previously in both Parts I and II, Capote strives to create a strong feeling of sympathy in the reader so that the reader is even more distraught at the murder of the Clutter family, understands the tremendous effect it had not only in Holcomb but across the nation and also to despise the murderers even more.  In Truman Capote’s ‘Answers’, we continue to sympathize with those affected by the murder of the Clutter family rather than sympathizing with the Clutters which Capote tried to make us do in part I of ‘In Cold Blood’.  To begin Part III, Floyd Wells is introduced as an ex-worker for Herb Clutter who after hearing about the murder of him and his family, “Was stunned… he ‘didn’t hardly believe it.’… [Floyd] liked Mr. Clutter much as much as any man [he’d] ever met’… ‘I never forgot them”(160). This is another example of how many people, fond, of Herb and his family, were deeply affected at the hearing of their deaths, as here, Floyd Little, a prisoner, reminisces about his past with them.  Later on page 163, we feel sympathy for Al Dewey as well as his family, who ever since he took on the Clutter case, have been living a hectic, restless, and depressing life.  Capote informs us that, “When Dewey got home, Marie was in the kitchen preparing supper.  The moment he appeared, she launched an account of household upsets.  The family cat had attacked the cocker-spaniel… And Paul, their nine year old, had fallen out of a tree…” As readers it is seemingly impossible not to sympathize with a man, who coming home from a long day of investigation, with nothing to show for it, has to deal with his families problems.  We sympathize with Dewey again on page 165 when we find Marie trying to warn him from another possible disappointment of a lead, and when Capote informs us that, “she worried about his health.  His state of mind was bad; he was emancipated; and he was smoking sixty cigarettes a day.”  These are just a few examples of how Capote attempts to have his audience sympathize with his characters in Part III.