It happened as Michal feared. Her father sent officers to take David. Michal made answer that her husband was ill and could not be disturbed. At last Saul would not be longer put off, and ordered his messengers to force their way into David’s apartment, when they discovered the deception which had been played so successfully, Saul’s rage knew no bounds, and his fury was such that Michal was obliged to resort to another deception by pretending that David attempted to kill her. When Michal let David down by a rope through a window on that memorable night in which she saved his life, it was the last time she saw her husband for many years. When the rupture between Saul and David became open, Saul gave Michal in marriage to Phaltiel, of Gallim, a village not far from the royal residence at Gibeah. After the death of Saul, Michal and her new husband moved with the royal family to the east of Jordan. It was at least fourteen years since she had watched David’s disappearance down the rope into the darkness of the night and had imperilled her own life to save his. During all these years, it would seem, his love for his absent wife had undergone no change, for he was eager to reclaim her when the first opportunity presented itself. That opportunity came when Abner revolted from Ishbosheth. Important as it was to him to make an alliance with the court of Ishbosheth, established at Mahanaim, and much as he respected Abner, he would not listen for a moment to any overtures till his wife was restored. And David sent messengers to Ishbosheth saying, “Deliver me my wife Michal.” There seemed to be no alternative, and Michal was taken from Phaltiel. That she had equally won the love of Phaltiel is manifest from the sad scene when she was taken from him, and now under the joint escort of David’s messengers and Abner’s twenty men, _en route_ from Mahanaim to Hebron, he followed behind, bewailing the wife thus torn from him, and would not turn back until commanded to do so by Abner.