And with this he spread his arms upon the table and laid his head upon them. He felt as if his career was ended and his heart broken. Ben Greenway said no more to comfort him, but at that moment he himself was the happiest man on the Caribbean Sea. He seated himself in the little dirty cabin, and his soul saw visions. He saw his master, deprived of all his belongings, and with them of every taint of piracy, and put on shore, accompanied, of course, by his faithful servant. He saw a ship sail, perhaps soon, perhaps later, for Jamaica; he saw the blithe Mistress Kate, her soul no longer sorrowing for an erring father, come on board that vessel and sail with him for good old Bridgetown. He saw everything explained, everything forgotten. He saw before the dear old family a life of happiness--perhaps he saw the funeral of Madam Bonnet--and, better than all, he saw the pirate dead, the good man revived again.
To be sure, he did not see Dickory Charter returning to his old home with his mother, for he could not know what Blackbeard was going to do with that young fellow; but as Dickory had thought of him when he had escaped with Kate from the Revenge, so thought he now of Dickory. There were so many other important things which bore upon the situation that he was not able even to consider the young fellow.
It did not take very long for a man of practical devilishness, such as Blackbeard was, to finish the business which had called him away, and he soon reappeared in the cabin.
"Ho there! good Sir Nightcap--an I may freely call you that since now I own you, uniform, cocked hat, title, and everything else--don't cry yourself to sleep like a baby when its toys are taken away from it, but wake up. I have a bit of liking for you, and I believe that that is because you are clean. Not having that virtue myself, I admire it the more in others, and I thank you from my inmost soul--wherever that may be--for having provided such comely quarters and such fair accommodations for me while I shall please to sail the Revenge. But I shall not condemn you to idleness and cankering thoughts, my bold blusterer, my terror of the sea, my harrier of the coast, my flaunter of the Jolly Roger washed clean in the tub with soap; I shall give you work to do which shall better suit you than the troublesome trade you've been trying to learn. You write well and read, I know that, my good Sir Nightcap; and, moreover, you are a fair hand at figures. I have great work before me in landing and selling the fine cargoes you have brought me, and in counting and dividing the treasure you have locked in your iron-bound chests. And you shall attend to all that, my reformed cutthroat, my regenerated sea-robber. You shall have a room of your own, where you can take off that brave uniform and where you can do your work and keep your accounts and so shall be happier than you ever were before, feeling that you are in your right place."