Summary, Part Three

This section begins by introducing Floyd Wells, a former roommate of Dick Hickock. We discover that he was the one who gave Dick the idea to murder the Clutter family. Wells used to work on the Clutter farm, and at one point he told Dick of the job. Dick had become obsessed with finding out every detail about the house and the people in it. He often told Wells of his plans to murder the whole family, but Floyd “thought it was just talk” so he didn’t think about it after Dick left. But now, as Wells is listening to the radio, he hears about the murders, just as Dick had said they’d be.

Dewey gets the news of the two suspects, and takes a manila folder home with their information. Now the main goal is to track them down, and they do that by contacting anyone who was connected in some way to Dick or Perry.

Agent Nye’s first stop is Dick’s parents’ house. We learn more about his background, and why he turned to crime in the first place.

Now, we transition over to Dick and Perry. They’ve been hitchhiking since they got out of Mexico, and are now about to be picked up by a traveling salesman called “Mr. Bell.” Dick and his partner plan to kill Bell and steal his car, but their plan is foiled when the generous man picks up another hitchhiker.

Back to Agent Nye. He first goes to a former cathouse where Perry sent a large box containing his belongings. Nye then appears at Perry’s sister’s door, asking if she had any information regarding his whereabouts.

Smith is getting worried. When Dick stays out too long, Perry fears that he’s been arrested, and that now they’re coming for him. When Dick finally returns, he tells Perry that he has since replaced their license plate with a new one, and stolen fifty dollars from an old friend.

We then move back to Agent Dewey. And he is having a nightmare. He sees the two killers in a café and though he chases them, he wakes up in his office. He then gets a call that Dick had written bad checks throughout Kansas City.

After we check in with Bobby, we find Dick and Perry on the road again, deciding whether or not to pick up a young boy and his grandfather. Perry convinces Dick to do it, and the boy tells them of a way to get some money. They all search for bottles thrown about and turn them in for refund money.

Alvin Dewey has just been given word that Perry and Dick had been arrested in Las Vegas. He gets there as soon as he can and he and the rest of the agents on the case begin to interrogate the two suspects.

After several hours of interrogation, Perry tells the police officers exactly what happened the night of the murders. All the questions have been answered, and now, the killers wait for their inevitable execution.