Truman Capote makes Barbara Smith’s life and family seem just like the life of the Clutters. She has almost everything that she could want or need and is very well liked by her friends. This correlation shows that these are both 2 families that have been drastically affected by the actions of Perry Smith. He ruthlessly murdered the Clutter family, and Barbara’s family lives in fear of ever seeing him again. Barbara dreads the intrusion of the other world that Perry represents. Perry’s lives in a world of crime, resentment, poverty, and self-destruction. Perry and Barbara are divided on the topic of their father, Tex John Smith. Barbara has grown to respect and admire Tex John over the years while Perry shows a lot of resentment towards his father, blaming him for the lack of childhood that he so desperately needed and the lack of growth intellectually. Perry tells Capote that, “I happen to have a brilliant mind. In case you didn’t know. . . But no education, because he didn’t want me to learn anything, only how to tote and carry for him. Dumb. Ignorant. That’s the way he wanted me to be” (185). The fact that Perry missed the chance to grow intellectually, and missed his chance to have a normal life leaves him bitter and frustrated. The fact that Barbara does not miss out on these opportunities had allowed her to settle into a lifestyle much like the Clutters, two people/families that Perry is very jealous of. This association between Barbara and the Clutter is established in a thoughtful moment of Perry’s, “One fine day he’d pay her back, have a little fun—talk to her, advertise his abilities, spell out in detail the things he was capable of doing to people like her, respectable people, safe and smug people, exactly like Bobo” (194). This thinking shows that Perry is so resentful for the lack of childhood he received, that he is willing to do anything to harm those people that got everything that he didn’t.