9 Then they said to one another, “We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news! If we are silent and wait until the light of morning, they will find us and we will be punished. So then, come, let us go and tell the house of the king.”
10 When they came, they called to the gatekeepers of the city and told them, saying, “We came to the camp of the Arameans, and behold, there was no man or the voice of a man there! Only the horses and the donkeys were tied up, and the tents were left as they were.”
11 Then the gatekeepers called and told it inside the house of the king.
12 The king got up in the night and said to his servants, “Please let me tell you what the Arameans have done to us. The Arameans know that we are hungry, so they went out from the camp to hide in the field, saying, ‘When they go out from the city, we shall seize them alive and go into the city.’ ”
13 Then one of his servants replied and said, “Please let them take five of the remaining horses which remain in the city; behold, they are like all of the multitude of Israel that remain in it; they are like all the multitude of Israel who have perished. Let us send and see.”
14 So he took two charioteer horsemen, and the king sent after the camp of the Arameans, saying, “Go, find out,”
15 and they went after them to the Jordan. Look, all of the way was littered with clothes and equipment which the Arameans had thrown away in their haste. Then the messengers returned and told the king.