"And so shall they be again, my father," said Kate, her arms around his neck.
It was then that Ben Greenway knocked upon the door.
Stede Bonnet's mind had been so much excited by what he had been talking about that he saluted his brother-in-law and Dame Charter without once thinking of his clothes. They looked upon him as if he were some unknown foreigner, a person entirely removed from their customary sphere.
"Was this the once respectable Stede Bonnet?" asked Dame Charter to herself. "Did such a man marry my sister!" thought Mr. Delaplaine. They might have been surprised had they met him as a pirate, but his appearance as a pirate's clerk amazed them.
Towards the end of the day Mr. Delaplaine and his party returned to the Belinda, for there was no fit place for them to lodge in the town. Although urged by all, Stede Bonnet would not accompany them. When persuasion had been exhausted, Ben Greenway promised Kate that he would be responsible for her father's appearance the next day, feeling safe in so doing; for, even should Bonnet's shame return, there was no likely way in which he could avoid his friends.
[CHAPTER XXV]
WISE MR. DELAPLAINE
