With that last farewell the brave heart of the little creature broke, and it stretched itself and died.
Israel saw it all.

His heart bled to see the parting in silence between those two, for not more dumb was the goat that now was dead than the human soul that was left alive.

He tried to put the goat from Naomi's arms, saying, "It was only a goat, my child; think of it no more," though it smote him with pain to say it, for had not the creature given its life for her life?
And where, O God, was the difference between them?
But Naomi clung to the goat, and her throat swelled and her bosom fluttered, and her whole body panted, and it was almost as if her soul were struggling to burst through the bonds that bound it, that she might speak and ask and know.
"Oh, what does it mean?
Why is it?
Why?
Why ?" Such were the questions that seemed ready to break from her tongue.

And, thinking to answer her, Israel drew her to him and said, "It is dead, my child--the goat is dead." But as he spoke that word he saw by her face, as by a flash of light in a dark place, that, often as he had told her of death, never until that hour had she known what it was.

Then, if the words that he had spoken of death had carried no meaning, what could he hope of the words that he had spoken of life, and of the little things which concerned their household?
And if Naomi had not heard the words he had said of these--if she had not pondered and interpreted them--if they had fallen on her ear only as voices in a dark cavern--only as dead birds on a dead sea--what of the other words, the greater words, the words of the Book of the Law and the Prophets, the words of heaven and of the resurrection and of God?
Had the hope of his heart been vanity?
Did Naomi know nothing?
Was her great gift a mockery?
Israel's feet were set in a slippery place.