Go to the king and speak to him in the following fashion.” Then Joab told her what to say.

But Absalom said, “Call for Hushai the Arkite, and let’s hear what he has to say.”

Smoke ascended from his nose; fire devoured as it came from his mouth; he hurled down fiery coals.

David said to him, “Your blood be on your own head! Your own mouth has testified against you, saying ‘I have put the Lord’s anointed to death.’”

So the watchman called out and informed the king. The king said, “If he is by himself, he brings good news.” The runner came ever closer.

So David said to all his servants who were with him in Jerusalem, “Come on! Let’s escape! Otherwise no one will be delivered from Absalom! Go immediately, or else he will quickly overtake us and bring disaster on us and kill the city’s residents with the sword.”

Jonadab, the son of David’s brother Shimeah, said, “My lord should not say, ‘They have killed all the young men who are the king’s sons.’ For only Amnon is dead. This is what Absalom has talked about from the day that Amnon humiliated his sister Tamar.

The king said, “Did Joab put you up to all of this?” The woman answered, “As surely as you live, my lord the king, there is no deviation to the right or to the left from all that my lord the king has said. For your servant Joab gave me instructions. He has put all these words in your servant’s mouth.