Lin and Tariq Are Attacked by Wild Dogs; Abdullah Comes to Their Aid

The attack on Lin and Tariq by a pack of wild dogs becomes a turning point in Lin’s reluctant care for the boy: the danger forces them to defend one another, and Lin recognizes a love he had resisted acknowledging. Abdullah’s sudden arrival ends the fight, but the encounter’s lasting consequence is the change in Lin’s relationship with Tariq.

Context and Stakes

Lin and Tariq are walking along the edge of the slum at night. Lin knows the route and has grown accustomed to the surroundings, but Tariq follows carefully, trying to place his feet where Lin has stepped. Lin understands that the path and its surroundings are frightening to a newcomer. Rather than reassure the boy, however, he remains silent. Tariq has been placed in Lin’s care, and Lin is angry with himself for having failed to tell Khaderbhai that he did not want the responsibility. He hopes that the experience will make Tariq unhappy enough to ask his uncle to take him away.

The tension between them is interrupted when barking spreads from one dog to several and then many. Lin cannot see the animals in the darkness, but hears them coming from an open field. He estimates that they occupy a wide area, and realizes that the route back to the slum is exposed. The dogs approach in a crescent, blocking their retreat. The threat is not abstract: attacks on people are common in the city’s slums, and Lin has treated dog and rat bites at his clinic. He also knows of a drunken man recovering in hospital after an attack and a child killed at that location a month earlier. The pair are isolated, and Lin judges that Tariq could not reach safety on his own.

Lin’s Attempt to Protect Tariq

With the slum too far away to reach safely, Lin looks for a place to make a stand. A pile of timber and construction materials offers both a source of makeshift weapons and a better-lit area. He tells Tariq to run when instructed, then throws a plastic bag containing clothes that Karla had lent him into the pack. The dogs crowd around the bundle, giving the two a brief opportunity to move. Lin sends Tariq ahead and runs to the scrap wood, where he takes a sturdy length of bamboo.

The dogs hesitate when they see the weapon, but the pause does not disperse them. Lin tells Tariq to climb onto his back, and the boy holds tightly around his neck while Lin tries to keep the pack at a distance. When a large black dog rushes at them, Lin strikes it with the bamboo. The group continues to advance and make repeated approaches from different directions. Lin’s blows deter individual dogs for only a short time; as the struggle continues, the animals grow bolder. After about ten minutes, Lin is tired and fears that his slowing reactions will leave Tariq exposed. He hopes someone in the slum will hear the commotion, while recognizing that people there have often heard dogs at night without responding.

Tariq’s Courage and Lin’s Recognition

Lin stumbles and falls near the timber. In that moment, Tariq slips from his back, regains his footing, and stands between Lin and the black dog. The boy takes a piece of wood and strikes the animal’s snout. His intervention briefly checks the pack leader and gives the pair a chance to keep resisting. Tariq’s action reverses their roles: the child Lin had expected to frighten into leaving him now helps defend them both.

As the dogs close in again, Tariq remains beside Lin. They fight back together, standing side by side and then back to back as the pack presses them toward the timber. Lin understands that they are losing ground and that there is nowhere left to retreat. The decisive change for him has already taken place, however. Seeing Tariq stand his ground brings an intense, protective love that Lin recognizes as a father’s love for a son. The feeling contradicts his earlier wish that Tariq would be miserable and leave. It also recalls words from Karla’s poem, which return to Lin’s mind as he rises to continue defending the boy.

Abdullah’s Intervention and Aftermath

With the pair trapped beside the timber, Abdullah suddenly leaps over them into the pack. He carries a metal rod about a metre long and strikes at the dogs with the practiced movements of a trained fighter. His approach differs from Lin and Tariq’s defensive struggle: Abdullah takes the fight directly to the animals, and the pack retreats. Two dogs are killed in the encounter. The change from surrounding noise to silence marks the end of the immediate danger. Abdullah turns toward Lin and Tariq with the rod raised over his shoulder, smiling.

Later, the three drink sweet tea in Lin’s hut. Abdullah explains that he had been waiting there for Lin and heard the dogs; he came to investigate because he sensed that something was wrong. After they have discussed what happened several times, Lin makes places for all three to sleep on the hut’s bare earth floor. Abdullah and Tariq fall asleep readily, while Lin remains awake, thinking through the events of the preceding days. Madame Zhou, Karla, Khaderbhai’s council, and Sapna all seem to belong to a series of forces whose purposes Lin cannot yet understand. The attack thus ends not only with rescue but with Lin considering how his life is being shaped by decisions and relationships whose direction remains uncertain.

Significance

The encounter brings together physical danger and an emotional reversal. Lin begins the walk hoping that Tariq will reject the care imposed on him; when the danger arrives, Lin’s choices are organized around protecting the boy. Tariq, in turn, does not remain simply the frightened child Lin expects, but acts to defend Lin when he falls. Their mutual defense gives concrete form to the bond Lin recognizes in the midst of the crisis.

Abdullah’s rescue completes the immediate action, while his account of having waited for Lin connects the danger to the trust and vigilance of their wider circle. The episode also recalls the community’s unequal exposure to threats: Lin knows that violence involving animals is a recurring risk around the slum, but the noise has often gone unanswered. In this instance, Abdullah does respond. The rescue resolves the danger of the night; it does not remove Lin’s uncertainty about the larger course of events, which remains in his thoughts after Tariq and Abdullah have fallen asleep.