Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone Chapter 17 Summary

How It All Goes Down

The Man with Two Faces

  • Harry is confronted by Quirrell, who immediately says he was using Snape as a cover.
  • Harry's confused, saying he thought Snape tried to murder him during Quidditch, but Quirrell reveals that was him. Quirrell says that Snape tried to referee the next game to protect Harry too.
  • Quirrell says he's going to kill Harry now, though, and binds him with magic rope.
  • He admits he brought the troll in, and was foiled by Harry and Snape – he didn't get past Fluffy then.
  • Now, though, he wants to look into the Mirror of Erised, which is what's hidden in this last room. He says that's how he'll find the Stone.
  • Harry tries to distract Quirrell by asking about Snape – Quirrell says Snape was suspicious of him all along, but he did also hate Harry because of his background with Harry's father.
  • Quirrell adds that he wasn't talking to Snape when Harry overheard him begging, but to Voldemort. He says Voldemort taught him to reevaluate good and evil, but has punished him when he's failed in the past.
  • Harry realizes he saw Quirrell at the Leaky Cauldron on the day that someone tried to rob Gringotts.
  • While Quirrell's puzzling over the Stone, Harry realizes that he can also use the mirror to figure out where the Stone is. But because he's tied up with magic rope, he falls over.
  • A creepy voice insists Quirrell should have Harry help him figure out where the Stone is, so Quirrell makes Harry come look in the mirror.
  • Harry decides to lie.
  • When he looks in the mirror he sees himself holding the Stone, and his reflection winks. Harry realizes the real stone is in his pocket.
  • He lies to Quirrell that he sees school success in the mirror and Quirrell pushes him away… but the voice makes him come back, saying that he's not telling the truth.
  • The voice says it wants to speak directly to Harry. Quirrell unwraps his turban and turns around, revealing, instead of the back of his head, a face so frightening that Harry can't even speak.
  • The face talks to Harry, saying that it's been living a half-life, feeding on its followers' bodies and drinking unicorn blood. It's waiting to get the Stone so it can make an Elixir of Life and become fully alive again.
  • It knows that Harry has the Stone and asks him for it, before taunting him that he'll end up dead just like his parents. He says Harry's parents begged and pleaded while he killed them.
  • Harry refuses, calling him a liar. Quirrell's body/Voldemort's face come after up as Harry tries to make a break for it.
  • When Quirrell/Voldemort touches him, Harry has major pain in his head and screams. But he realizes that Quirrell is in pain when he touches him. Even though Voldemort urges Quirrell to grab Harry and kill him, each time Quirrell touches him he gets burned. Just when Quirrell is going to death-curse Harry, Harry grabs him by the face and then the arm, trying to distract him with the pain. He holds on, struggling, until he blacks out.
  • When he wakes up, he sees Dumbledore.
  • Harry freaks out and tries to warn Dumbledore about the Stone, and Dumbledore calms him down. Harry figures out that he's in the infirmary.
  • Dumbledore says all his friends have sent him candy and presents, and that everybody in the school knows what happened and is worried about him. Harry's been in the infirmary for three days.
  • Dumbledore says he got there in time to keep Quirrell from getting the Stone. As soon as he got to London, he realized that he should be at Hogwarts. He got back in the nick of time, to save Harry from Quirrell – although at first he worried that Harry had died.
  • To Harry's amazement, Dumbledore says that Flamel and his wife are okay with the Stone being destroyed, and they've had enough of immortality.
  • Harry asks about whether Voldemort is going to come back, and Dumbledore says that he will – he abandoned Quirrell to death and will find someone else to help him in his quest. Their job will be to try and keep him from ever getting full strength again.
  • Harry asks why Voldemort tried to kill him – since Voldemort told him he killed Harry's mother in an attempt to get to Harry – and Dumbledore says he can't tell him that yet.
  • Dumbledore does say that his mother's love protected Harry from beyond the grave, and that's why touching Harry was so painful for Quirrell/Voldemort.
  • This makes Harry cry.
  • Dumbledore says that he brought Harry's dad's invisibility cloak to him.
  • He also says that Prof. Snape did hate his dad, but it was because Harry's dad saved him from death once.
  • Finally, Dumbledore tells Harry that he (Harry) pulled the Stone from the mirror because he (Dumbledore) made an enchantment that only the person who wanted the Stone without wanting to use it for immortality would be able to find it.
  • Then Dumbledore distracts Harry by eating some Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans.
  • After Dumbledore leaves, Harry convinces Madam Pomfrey to let Ron and Hermione in, just for a couple of minutes. They're super relieved he's okay and ask him to tell them what else happened after they parted ways in the passages. Then, Ron and Hermione fill Harry in on what happened with them: Hermione was helping Ron out to go for help and they passed by Dumbledore as he went in.
  • Ron wonders why Dumbledore gave Harry the invisibility cloak and he thinks Dumbledore was trying to prepare him.
  • As Ron and Hermione are leaving, Ron tells Harry that the next day will be the year-end banquet, where they award the house cup. Slytherin is the winner, but it should be fun anyway.
  • The next day, Madam Pomfrey tells Harry he can go to the banquet, but first he has a visit from Hagrid. Hagrid's devastated that he revealed the calming-Fluffy secret to Voldemort, and Harry soothes him. Hagrid gives Harry a wonderful present: a book of magic photographs of his parents.
  • That night Harry gets to the feast just in time. Everything's decorated to celebrate Slytherin.
  • Dumbledore makes announcements about giving out the house cup. Slytherin is in first place, but Dumbledore says there are still some points to award. He gives Ron fifty points for the game of chess, Hermione fifty points for her use of logic, and Harry sixty points for his bravery.
  • The students go wild because the additional points tie Gryffindor with Slytherin.
  • Finally, Dumbledore gives Neville ten points for his courage. The Gryffindors freak out because they've won. The decorations magically change to Gryffindor and the four point-getters are smothered by praise from their house. Harry can tell Snape is upset, but he doesn't mind, because he's so happy.
  • After the whole Voldemort thing, the exams seem kind of like a letdown. All four friends pass, Hermione with the best scores of the year. Then, they have to pack up for the summer.
  • They retrace their steps on the Hogwarts Express and return to platform nine and three-quarters.
  • After crossing the platform, Harry, Ron, and Hermione say goodbye. Mr. Dursley comes to pick Harry up and as Harry's leaving, he tells his friends that being able to do magic will make the summer break way more tolerable.