The skinny dogs of the town soon found it.And after these scavengers of the East had torn the putrefying flesh and gnawed the multitude of bones, they prowled around the country, with tongues lolling out, in search of water.By this time there was none that they could come at nearer than the sea, and that was salt.Nevertheless, they lapped it, so burning was their thirst, and went mad, and came back to the town.
Then the people hunted them and killed them.
Now, it chanced that a mad dog from the Mukabar was being hunted to death on a day when Naomi, who had become accustomed to the tumult of the streets, had first ventured out in them alone, save for her goat, that went before her.The goat was grown old, but it was still her constant companion and also it was now her guide and guardian, for the little dumb creature seemed to know that she was frail and helpless.And so it was that she was crossing the Sok el Foki, a market of the town, and hearkening only to the patter of the feet of the goat going in front, when suddenly she heard a hundred footsteps hurrying towards her, with shouts and curses that were loud and deep.
She stood in fear on the spot where she was, and no eyes had she to see what happened next, and she had none save the goat to tell her.
But out of one of the dark arcades on the left, leading downward from the hill, the mad dog came running, before a multitude of men and boys.And flying in its despair, it bit out wildly at whatever lay in its way, and Naomi, in her blindness, stood straight in front of it.Then she must have fallen before it, but instantly the goat flung itself across the dog's open jaws, and butted at its foaming teeth, and sent up shrill cries of terror.
The dog stopped a moment, for such love was human, and it seemed as if the madness of the monster shrank before it.But the people came down with their wild shouts and curses, and the dog sprang upon the goat and felled it, and fled away.The people followed it, and then Naomi was alone in the market-place, and the goat lay at her feet.