67 pages 2 hours read

Stephen King

It

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1986

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Part 5Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 5: “The Ritual of Chüd”

Part 5, Chapter 19 Summary: “In the Watches of the Night”

Mike says it’s time for sleep. They will meet the next day to go into the Barrens: “There’s another force—at least there was when we were kids—that wanted us to stay alive and do the job. Maybe it’s still there” (912). Beverly screams. The scars on her hands have broken open and are bleeding. It happens to them all. They hold hands and stand in a circle. Bill thinks about what they're doing: “Chüd this is the ritual of Chüd and the Turtle cannot help us” (913). Books fly off the shelves, the doors slam, and then it is quiet. They remember everything that has happened. All of the gaps are gone.

Beverly and Bill walk together outside, holding hands. She tells Bill a memory of how much she hated her dad, and what had happened one day when she come home from playing with them in the Barrens.

When Beverly gets home, her father throws her across the room and says he worries about her. He asks her if she plays with boys in the Barrens, then slaps her. He tells her to take pants off: “I want to see if you are intact” (919). She thinks that It is there in the apartment, working through her father.