Behind displayed by naked herald, beginning to laugh in spite of everything (5,3)
I believe the answer is:
after all
'in spite of everything' is the definition.
(I've seen this in another clue)
'behind displayed by naked herald beginning to laugh' is the wordplay.
'behind' becomes 'aft' (aft means towards or at the end of a ship).
'displayed by' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'naked' means to look at the middle letters (outside letters removed so centre is unclothed).
'beginning to' suggests taking the first letters.
The centre of 'herald' is 'eral'.
The first letter of 'laugh' is 'l'.
'aft'+'eral'+'l'='AFTER ALL'
(Other definitions for after all that I've seen before include "in the final reckoning?" , "most importantly" , "In spite of any indications to the contrary" , "Behind from start to finish" , "Taking everything into account" .)