The Shining Chapter 39 Summary

How It All Goes Down

On the Stairs

  • At around 7:15 in the evening Danny is sitting on the stairway that connects the lobby and the first floor. This is about the same time that Halloran is asking his boss for the days off.
  • Danny is tossing a ball from one hand to the other and singing.
  • He has a fat lip and a bloody chin.
  • She asks him about it, and he tells her it wasn't Jack.
  • Now she's asking him if Tony showed him something.
  • He tells her, "It doesn't matter" (39.11).
  • She grabs his shoulder a little too hard, and Danny repeats himself. He tells her "the people in the hotel" are keeping Tony from visiting him from now on. The "things" (39.16) in the hotel are also keeping Tony out.
  • He tells her that the hotel wants all of them, and that it's fooling Jack to make him do what it wants. He tells her he knows Jack tossed the snowmobile part into the snow, and that he's seen the woman in 217.
  • Wendy wants to know if Jack will "try to hurt" them. He says that the hotel will "try to make him" (39.25).
  • He tells her he's been calling for Halloran, but he hasn't answered yet.
  • When he tells her that Jack's in the basement and will probably stay there all night, she tells him she'll be right back.
  • She goes into the kitchen, selects a very sharp knife, and goes back to Danny.
  • He's listening to a voice in his head, trying to get him to stay at the Overlook forever.
  • The ballroom clock strikes 7:30.
  • Wendy and Danny lock themselves into the bedroom with the knife.
  • Danny is thinking that Jack wants to join the people in the hotel so he can be immortal.
  • Wendy is thinking of taking Danny up into the mountains – dying there would be better than dying in the hotel.
  • It begins to snow very hard.