16 Now send messengers quickly to tell David, ‘Don’t rest tonight in the river crossings in the desert, but make sure you cross ⌊the river⌋, or Your Majesty and all the troops with him will be wiped out.’ ”
17 Jonathan and Ahimaaz were waiting at En Rogel. They could not risk being seen coming into the city, so a servant girl was to go and tell them, and they were to go and tell King David.
18 But a young man saw Jonathan and Ahimaaz and told Absalom. So both of them left quickly and came to the home of a man in Bahurim who had a cistern in his courtyard, and they went down into it.
19 The man’s wife took a cover, spread it over the top of the cistern, and scattered some grain over it so that no one could tell it was there.
20 Absalom’s servants came to the woman at her home. “Where are Ahimaaz and Jonathan?” they asked.The woman said, “They’ve crossed the stream.”The servants looked for them but did not find them. So Absalom’s servants returned to Jerusalem.
21 After Absalom’s servants left, both men came out of the cistern and went and told King David. “Leave right away,” they told David. “Cross the river quickly because this is what Ahithophel has advised against you. . . .”
22 David and all the troops with him left to cross the Jordan River. When the dawn came, everyone had crossed the Jordan River.