The attack on Lin and Tariq turns a dangerous walk back to the slum into a fight for survival, and changes the meaning of Lin’s reluctant responsibility for the boy. Surrounded by a pack too large to outrun, Lin must protect Tariq with whatever is at hand. The crisis exposes courage in the child, brings Abdullah unexpectedly to their aid, and makes Lin recognize his love for Tariq as a father’s love.

Background and approach

Before the dogs appear, Lin is already struggling with the responsibility of caring for Tariq. He remembers how frightening the slum’s edge had felt when he first arrived, but what once repelled him has become familiar: its smell signifies home and the collective shelter of the community. He understands that Tariq, a stranger to the place, is likely frightened and sickened. Yet Lin does not comfort him. Angry at himself for failing to tell Khaderbhai that he did not want the child in his care, Lin hopes Tariq will become so unhappy that he asks his uncle to take him away.

The tension ends when dogs begin barking in the open field. Lin cannot see them in the darkness, but hears the howling spread and realizes they are advancing. Their reputation makes the danger more than a threat in the moment: attacks on people are common, and Lin treats dog bites at his small clinic. The pack, estimated at twenty to forty animals, approaches in a wide crescent that blocks the way back to the slum. Dogs that seem submissive by day become dangerous in packs at night, leaving Lin and Tariq with little room to escape.

The fight on the path

With the dogs closing in, Lin judges that the slum is too far away to reach safely with Tariq. A nearby pile of timber and construction materials offers both a place to make a stand and potential weapons. Lin tells Tariq to run on command, then throws the plastic bag containing clothes Karla had lent him into the pack. While the dogs are distracted by the bundle, Lin sends Tariq toward the timber and follows, taking up a length of stout bamboo as the animals turn back toward them.

The stick gives the pair a moment’s resistance, not a way out. The dogs approach from several directions, make repeated rushes, and grow bolder when Lin’s blows fail to stop them for long. He tells Tariq to climb onto his back so he can defend the child while keeping him close. As the pack presses in, Lin stumbles and falls beside the timber. In that instant, he fears for Tariq and sees the boy slip from his grasp. Tariq gets to his feet, takes a piece of wood, and strikes the leading dog. His sudden courage helps hold the pack back briefly, but the animals regroup and attack again.

Tariq and Abdullah turn the fight

Tariq’s action changes what Lin sees in him. The boy stands beside him and fights to protect them both, and Lin recognizes that his own response is no longer resentment or duty. He feels love for Tariq, explicitly understood as a father’s love, and recalls a line from Karla’s poem about dying for love. The recognition arrives not after the danger has passed, but while the two are still fighting to survive it.

They retreat against the timber pile, defending themselves together as the pack closes around them. Then Abdullah appears, leaping into the dogs’ midst from behind. Armed with a metal rod more than a metre long, he attacks instead of waiting for the pack to come at him. His decisive counterattack breaks the animals’ advance and sends them fleeing; two dogs are killed. The change in the fight is also a change in its balance: Lin and Tariq had been trying to hold the pack off, while Abdullah takes the initiative and forces it back. When the noise stops, he turns toward them with the rod raised over his shoulder.

Aftermath and significance

Later, the three drink hot, sweet Suleimani chai in Lin’s hut. Abdullah explains that he had been waiting there, heard the dogs, and went to investigate because he sensed something was wrong. His arrival therefore comes from the nearby connection he already has with Lin, rather than from a planned rescue. After they talk through what happened, Lin makes three places on the bare earth floor and they lie down to rest.

Abdullah and Tariq fall asleep, but Lin remains awake, turning over the events of the preceding days. He feels caught among forces and personalities stronger or more mysterious than himself, and wonders whether the signs around him point toward leaving or staying. The attack thus ends in immediate safety without resolving the wider uncertainty of Lin’s direction. Its decisive personal consequence is clearer: the boy Lin had wished to send away has become someone he loves and is willing to defend, while Abdullah’s intervention confirms that Lin is not alone when danger reaches the edge of the slum.