The 8th installment in our In Cold Blood serialistation.
JM and I swept away the leaves that had gathered at the Clutter family graves and laid out sunflowers. The stones seemed such a modest acknowledgment of four lives curtailed in a night of senseless violence. We hoped that with the completion of this fifty year cycle, Holcomb’s wounds could now begin to heal, that the residents could finally find some peace.
Capote wrote that the Clutter murders, “all told ended six human lives,” including those of the killers. In truth, it inadvertently ended his too. In Perry, Capote saw his own reflection. He once said: “It’s as if Perry and I grew up in the same house and one day he stood up and went out the back door, while I went out the front.”
By all reports Dick Hickock was an unlikeable character: a cheat, a blaggard. He stole for some twisted "emotional" reason, even when he had money. Perry stole for survival – he had become a thief out of necessity. By his own hand-wrought set of moral guidelines he made a clear distinction between himself and Dick.
And so it was, that of all the murders that Capote could have reported on, he chose this one: the probability of the murderers being caught was small; that they would be found and produce such detailed confessions smaller still; and that Capote would be allowed extended access into the their psyches, unthinkable - even in his most flamboyant of imaginations.
Friends of Capote say that he never recovered from witnessing Perry’s and Dick’s executions. Money and global fame followed for him, but a trail of destruction was left in their wake. Capote had hitherto successfully escaped the pain of his own troubled childhood, but as he reached the pinnacle of his professional success, misery engulfed him and he never wrote cohesively again.
Tara Darby is a photographer based in Hackney, London. She is a regular contributor to Another, Dazed & Confused and many other international publications. She is currently working on a short film and exhibition
JM Lapham is a musician based in Austin, Texas. He has recorded albums with the band, The Earlies, for Names/679, and collaborated with Micah P. Hinson on The Late Cord for 4AD. He is currently finishing an album for an as yet untitled new project
