And the witch said, “I cannot help you. The king has banished all the witches. If he were to find me, he would take my life.”
But Saul answered, “I am able to protect you. Only do as I ask and there shall no harm befall you.”
“Who is it,” asked the witch, “with whom you wish to speak?”
And Saul said, “Samuel.”
Then the witch began to use her mind. The first thing which her mind told her was that her visitor was no other than the king himself. And this the king confessed. “Be not afraid,” he said, “only bring Samuel to speak with me.” Then the witch’s mind told her what Samuel would say, if he were yet alive. She thought of the Philistine army and of Saul’s few soldiers. She thought of the sternness of Samuel, and how he had in his lifetime rebuked the king. It was plain that Samuel, if he could speak, would declare the sure defeat of Saul, and would say that it was a divine punishment upon him.
Now the house was as dark as the black night, except where a dim light showed the witch’s face and deepened the surrounding gloom. And suddenly the witch cried with a loud voice, and put her hands before her eyes; and Saul said, “What do you see?” And she said, “I see a god ascending out of the earth.” And Saul said, “What form is he of?” And the woman answered, “An old man cometh up, and he is covered with a mantle.”
When Saul heard that, he bowed down with his face to the ground. “What does he say?” said he.
In the darkness of the room, and in the confusion and mystery of the moment, Saul knew not whether the answering voice was that of the witch or of the prophet. But there was a Voice. And the Voice said, “Why hast thou disquieted me to bring me up?” And Saul answered, “I am sore distressed; for the Philistines make war upon me to destroy me, and God is departed from me, and answereth me no more, neither by prophets nor by dreams: therefore have I called thee, that thou mayest make known unto me what I shall do.”
And the Voice said, “Wherefore dost thou ask of me, seeing the Lord is departed from thee, and is become thine enemy? Because thou obeyedst not the voice of the Lord, therefore he hath rent the kingdom out of thine hand and given it to David. And to-morrow shalt thou and thy sons be with me.”
Then Saul fell straightway all along upon the earth, and was sore afraid because of the words of Samuel; and there was no strength in him, because he had eaten nothing all the day nor all the night. And the witch said, “Let me set a morsel of food before thee, that thou mayest have strength when thou goest on thy way.” But Saul said, “I will not eat.” At last, however, he got up from the floor and sat upon the bed, and ate, he and his two companions, and went away into the night.