Please go make yet more sure, and know and see his place where his haunt is, [and] who has seen him there; for it is told me that he deals very subtly.
Evidently the Ziphites thought that they would be better off if they informed Saul of David’s presence in their area than if the king discovered that he was there. He might have blamed them for sheltering David and taken revenge on them as he had on the people of Nob.