After listening to Hickock and Smith's apathetic confessions, Dewey concludes that the murders were "a psychological accident." Smith appears to have been led by a series of unfortunate events, not entirely of his own making, both before and after the murders. Capote meticulously details the seemingly minor twists of fate that, in his view, brought Smith to the Clutter home. As a child, Smith contracted pneumonia, which resulted in a reunion with his father and kept him out of school from the age of eight. He narrowly missed meeting his friend Willie Jay at the Kansas bus station by just a few hours; this meeting could have provided him a reason to separate from Hickock. Ultimately, Hickock's relentless bravado essentially forced him to return to Kansas after the murders, which eventually led to his capture by the police.