The Shining Chapter 29 Summary

How It All Goes Down

Kitchen Talk

  • They are in the kitchen now, and Jack has heated up water in the tea kettle.
  • Wendy tells him she didn't hurt Danny. He says he believes her. Even though he got a little thrill out of the tables being turned, he knows that Wendy would sooner die that hurt Danny.
  • He makes Danny hot tea with milk, sugar, and cooking sherry. Danny drinks it, and Wendy feels a little envious at their relationship. Is it possible that she was so quick to accuse Jack because of this envy?
  • She remembers being with her father at the playground as a child. She'd fallen and hurt her knees. Her mother had accused his father of neglecting her. She feels ashamed that she hadn't even considered the possibility of Jack's innocence.
  • After Danny has had some tea, Jack asks him to tell them what the story is.
  • Danny says he would have told them before, but he was confused about what is best.
  • Wendy tells Danny that she should have pressed him further in their conversation.
  • Jack wants to know why they were talking about him behind his back.
  • Wendy explains that it's because they love him and are worried about him. He talks in his sleep, and has taken up all his "old drinking habits […]" except for the drinking (29.37).
  • Wendy asks if he's finished the play. He says he hasn't, but that he's working on another idea.
  • She asks if he's working on whatever Al wanted him not to work on. He asks how she knows about that. When she tells him Danny told her, he expresses disbelief. When Jack asks Danny, he confirms it.
  • Now Jack demands to know who bruised Danny's neck. He says it was "[t]he woman in that room. 217. The dead lady" (29.49).
  • Wendy says she's never heard anything about this before.
  • Danny tells Jack that he's known all along that the Overlook was bad. He tells him about Tony showing him the "monster" (29.56) chasing after him. He tells him about "redrum" (29.56). He also tells him about Halloran and "the shine" (29.60), and about what he saw in the Presidential Suite.
  • Jack tells Danny and Wendy some of what he's read about the murders in the Presidential Suite.
  • Danny says there is something wrong with the playground, too, but he isn't sure what.
  • They press him to tell them about the woman in 217. In a frantic panic Danny describes what happened to him. He says the woman was after him, that she "wanted" (29.83) him, but in an unthinking, unfeeling kind of way.
  • Jack decides to go to room 217 to check it out.
  • Wendy protests, but Jack goes anyway.
  • Danny tells her that since Jack can't shine, the things in the hotel can't hurt him.
  • Wendy tells him she doesn't think that's true.