The duchess pressed further back into the sofa, eyes wide with alarm. “Can we please summon a footman and have this nuisance removed?” She flicked her fingers toward the cat before promptly sneezing again.
The duke snapped his fingers.
Unfortunately, finger-snapping did not summon footmen at Laverloch.
Fox glanced at the door, wondering how long it would take William and himself to corral Mr. Dandy.
Madeline placed her fists on her hips. “Mr. Dandy is not a . . . anuisance.” She pronounced the word carefully, likely scribbling it into her mental dictionary. “He is my bestest friend.”
“There will benocats,” the duke boomed.
Madeline flinched.
“Captain Carnegie, please remove this . . . thiscreaturefrom my duchess’s presence,” Westhampton continued.
The duke saidcreature,but from the tone of his voice, Fox was quite sure he meantdemon spawn.
Fox stood up, slowly. Leah followed.
Knowing Mr. Dandy and Madeline, the next five minutes could descend into rackety chaos.
“Noooooo! Mr. Dandy ismine!” Madeline shrieked, lunging for her blasted cat.
Mr. Dandy, of course, was two steps ahead of them all. He pivoted and dashed between Fox’s legs, causing the duchess to scream and pull her own feet up off the floor.
The cat leapt onto the pianoforte. And then, with Madeline racing toward him, arms outstretched, he curled and sprung upward, claws snagging onto one of the tapestries lining the wall. The cat then proceeded to climb up the fabric, claws digging in and taking him higher and higher.
The duchess screamed again.
The duke scrambled to his feet, eyes locked on the wayward cat, calling for help. William burst into the room, likely having been listening at the keyhole.
“Mr. Dandy! No!” Madeline called, jumping up and down. “You are being a . . . anuisance!”
Fox sighed, waving William out.
“Do we have a ladder tall enough to get the cat down?” he asked Leah,sotto voce.
“I dinnae think so,” she replied.
“Damn cat,” he muttered.
“This is quite enough!” the duke roared, placing a hand under his wife’s elbow. “Come, my dear.” He skewered Fox with a commanding look. “Prepare our granddaughter’s things. The sooner we leave that bedeviled creature behind, the better.”
Though Fox did not necessarily disagree with His Grace’s characterization of Mr. Dandy, he was not remotely close to capitulating and allowing Madeline to be taken from them.
“Your Grace, please see reason,” he began. “This is needlessly cruel. The cat has been Madeline’s companion through the thick and thin of her short life. She relies on the animal for comfort. Moreover, we are the only family Madeline has ever known. Surely, we can reach a compromis—”
“I am a duke, boy,” His Grace boomed. “I do not . . .compromise.”
“Mr. Dandy!” Madeline continued to shriek in her high, shrill voice.
The cat hissed in return, leaning out as the tapestry rippled with his weight.
The duchess screeched again.
“Leave the cat, girl,” the duke ordered. “A lady does not need a cat.”
The duke took a step, as if to snatch Madeline’s hand.
