“How can I go and do that?” Samuel asked. “Saul will hear about it and kill me!” The Lord answered, “Take a young cow with you and say, ‘I've come to sacrifice to the Lord.’
He told me, ‘Please let me go, because our family is having a sacrifice in the town and my brother told me I had to be there. If you think well of me, please let me go and see my brothers.’ That's why he's absent from the king's table.”
“He is,” they replied, “Up ahead of you. But you'll have to hurry. He's come to town today because the people are having a sacrifice at the high place.