It: Chapter 15 Summary & Analysis

Richie pushes his glasses up on his nose. The gesture feels familiar, though he has worn contact lenses for twenty years. He is listening to Mike’s story about the bird at the Ironworks. Mike also reminds the others of how the photo from Will Hanlon’s album had moved. Richie feels an exhilarating energy in the room and thinks of how it is a better high than cocaine. He thinks that it is the energy that one draws on in childhood, which slowly dissipates in adulthood.

Meanwhile, the adult version of the Losers’ Club continues to knock back their individual preferences for booze. Eddie is drinking gin-and-prune juice, Bill drinks bourbon, Mike opens another beer, and Beverly finishes her third screwdriver. Eddie breaks the silence that has overtaken the group and asks if It knows much about what they are doing in this moment. Ben reminds him that It was there a short while ago. Bill agrees that this means It knows what they are up to.

Suddenly, Richie half-stands, gropes for the table, then falls back into his chair. His eyes are burning. He suddenly understands why the memories have come back one at a time. If they came back all at once, it would have been like aiming “a psychological shotgun blast” at his temple. Richie then remembers he and Mike seeing It come in the “smoke-hole,” and Richie attributes the memory to the burning in his eyes. Richie recalls feeling it for the first time after Mike called him in California. Richie wonders if it is psychological but Mike thinks the sensation is as real as the balloons and the head in the icebox, or the dead body of Tony Tracker that Eddie saw earlier.

Richie recalls the story of the smoke-hole. He remembers that it occurred four or five days after Mike brought Will Hanlon’s photo album down to the Barrens. The clubhouse is done by this time. Ben has read about smoke-holes and shares the idea with the group. Richie pinpoints the day as July 17th, two days after the body of Jimmy Cullum is discovered and a day after Mr. Nell comes down to the Barrens again and sits right on the clubhouse without realizing that it’s there. He questions them carefully about Cullum, but there is not much that they have to tell him. In the present, Beverly prompts Richie to get to the core of his story, but he is figuring out where he should start.

Richie recalls Bill riding him to Kansas Street on Silver and stowing the bike under the little bridge there. Richie asks when Bill is going to tell everyone else—everyone except for him and Ben—about his plan to create silver bullets. Bill says that he won’t talk about it today, and Richie rightly suspects that Bill has second thoughts about the plan working. The boys cross to a clearing. Suddenly, a piece of ground about ten inches long by three inches wide swings up, and eyes look out of the blackness. They belong to Eddie, who says, “Who’s that trip-trapping on my bridge?” Richie Tozier goes into one of his voices—Pancho Vanilla. This routine sends Beverly and Ben, who is sitting next to her, go into a fit of giggles. Beverly prompts Ben to let them in and Bill and Richie drop through the hatch, which Ben closes again.

Bill asks what has been going on, and Eddie prompts Ben to tell Bill and Richie “the story” and see what they think. Ben, Beverly says, was telling a story about an “Indian ceremony,” which she thinks would be bad for Eddie’s asthma. Eddie calls it the “smoke-hole ceremony.” Ben then talks about the book he borrowed from the library—Ghosts of the Great Plains—which discusses how indigenous people from the Plains engaged in smoke ceremonies as part of their religion. However, the ceremonies were also competitions to see who could stand the smoke long enough to have visions. The visions were then supposed to tell the tribe what to do to solve a collective problem.

Bill thinks that the smoke-hole ceremony is a good idea. Richie thinks that, if anyone has a vision, it will be Bill. Ben thinks that it’s worth trying, though it may only work for Indians. He says that he has a hatchet, and they all help him cut some green wood. It takes an hour for them to cut four or five armfuls of branches. Beverly and Richie go to the bank of the Kenduskeag and collect stones. Richie then tells Beverly that she cannot participate in the ceremony because she is a girl. This makes her indignant, but Bill reasons that someone has to stay above ground in case anything goes wrong. Beverly asks why Eddie can’t do it, given his asthma, but no one responds. She realizes that they don’t they want her to participate because she’s a girl. Instead of crying, as Richie expects, she explodes in anger and curses all of them. Bill relents and asks who will stay out of the clubhouse. Beverly suggests that they draw matches.

Beverly takes out a book of matches. She lights a match and burns it out before adding it with six others. She then says that the person to draw the burnt match will be the one to stay outside of the clubhouse. They all pick a match and tell Beverly how much they love her. When none of them pulls a burnt match, Beverly thinks that she will be the one to stay out after all.  However, she, too, draws an unburnt match. When they accuse her of cheating, she shows them the faint mark of soot from where she burned the single match-head. Bill reasons that they all have to go down. When Eddie asks what will happen if they all pass out, Bill reasons that they will not, if Beverly is telling the truth about the matches. When Stanley asks how Bill knows this, but Bill says that he simply does.

Ben and Richie go down first, and the others hand down the rocks one by one. For kindling, Mike offers his tattered Archie comic book. They light a flame and watch it blaze up. The clubhouse begins to fill up with smoke. Ben is the first to complain about the smoke, and Richie suggests that he leave. Stan, however, is the first to leave. Ben moves over to fill the space that Stan has vacated, and Mike throws more sticks on the smoky fire. Then, Ben gets up and leaves. Eddie and Beverly are next. Bill begins to cough and can’t stop. Richie encourages him to leave, so as not to kill himself. Mike and Richie are now the only ones left. Mike throws more sticks on the fire. Not to be outdone, Richie throws some on, too.

Mike asks Richie how he is feeling. Richie says that he almost feels “good” and Mike asks if Richie has been having “funny thoughts.” Richie tilts his head back and feels that he is drifting away, like a balloon. Bill’s voice calls down, asking if the guys are all right. Richie hears the voice as distant but still disturbing and asks Bill to be quiet. The clubhouse suddenly feels bigger than ever. Richie holds his hand out to Mike. It seems as though Mike is on the other side of an enormous room. Richie notices that the vision is happening, and he is beginning to float.

Mike and Richie notice that they are no longer inside of the clubhouse but in the Barrens. However, the Barrens look different—lusher and greener. The air is hot and misty and not quite like Maine air in the summer. There is a flapping noise overhead and a group of bats flies by. They are the biggest bats that Richie has ever seen and he is frightened for a moment. Then, he remembers that there is no need to be scared, for it is only a vision. Mike and Richie move toward the sound of water from the river. In the “thick knee-high groundmist,” Richie cannot tell if his feet touch the ground. Birds flock across the sky, “squalling harshly.” The boys are in the Barrens as they had been thousands of years ago. They see dinosaurs and saber-toothed tigers. It feels now as though they are going back millions of years.

Suddenly, they hear “a tuneless, soulless sound.” Richie turns his head up toward the sky, where it is coming from. The sound takes on a voice that builds to “a shattering crescendo of sound.” The clouds in the west bloom with red fire. Richie recognizes a spaceship and thinks that, whatever came down so long ago must have come from another star or another galaxy. There is then an explosion. Richie senses It. Mike drags Richie to his feet and they run along the banks of the Kenduskeag during this vision. Richie is dimly aware of the fact that they are not running alone—animals seem to be with them, recognizing the arrival of an alien presence. Then, Richie begins to cough and call for Mike.

Richie’s eyes flutter open and Beverly is kneeling beside him, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief. The others stand behind her, looking “solemn and scared.” The side of Richie’s face hurts a lot and he tries to talk but can only croak. Richie asks if Beverly slapped him and she says she did; it was the only thing she knew to do. He also asks if he threw up and Beverly nods. Richie gets to his feet but is unsure if he is going to faint. Bill says that he and Ben pulled Richie and Mike Hanlon out of the clubhouse. Ben says it was very smoky inside the clubhouse and that the group became even more scared when they heard how much Richie and Mike were screaming. More strangely, the screams sounded far away. Ben and Bill also mention how much bigger the clubhouse looked.

Beverly asks if Richie really had a vision, like in Ben’s book. Richie says that, if he did, he does not wish to have another. Richie then asks Beverly for a cigarette, and tells the group about the feeling of going back in time and seeing the Kenduskeag turn “wild.” Mike talks about how they saw It come out of the sky, in something like a spaceship. Mike and Richie had the sense, during their vision. that It was bad.

Mike goes on to reason that It has always been there, since the beginning of time. He thinks that It may have been using the sewers, waiting for the ice to melt and people to come. Richie adds that this may be why It uses sewers and drains—as “regular freeways.” Stanley asks the two if they saw what It looks like and they shake their heads. Eddie wonders if they can beat a thing like that, but no one answers.