her, I don’t intend to let her go.”
Oh, blast and bedamned, that was the absolute wrong thing for Constance to say.
“And there,” Shaw replied, shoving out of his wing chair and grabbing his prayer book, “is the headstrong, disrespectful, self-centered nature that I vow I will not allow Ivy to develop. A worse influence on the girl I could not imagine than an arrogant aristocrat who swans across the village green, no respect for the family who has raised Ivy from birth. You assume that pretty dresses and silver teapots should mean more to a young woman’s well-being than a chance to serve God.”
Constance sent Robert a desperate look, as if she knew she’d taken a sharp wrong turn but could not find her way back to the right path.
Shaw glowered at Robert, as if he too expected mediation, placatory gestures, something, from the duke who sat like a useless clod on the lumpy sofa.
The peculiar, half-asleep, pins-and-needles sensation skipped down Robert’s arms and across his nape.
Say something. Do something.
“You abet this woman,” Shaw snapped. “What have you to say for yourself, Your Grace?”
Robert heard the words. He deduced from Shaw’s tone that he was supposed to reply. He perceived Mrs. Hodges coming through the open parlor door, a tray in her hands, and he knew that he was having a staring spell at the worst possible time.
“Yonder duke disdains to answer me,” Shaw said. “You may return the tray to the kitchen, Mrs. Hodges. My apologies for putting you to the trouble. His Grace and Lady Constance will be leaving.”
Shaw crossed his arms, barely possible given his rotund girth, and jerked his chin toward the door. Had Robert been capable of clapping, he would have applauded the reverend’s sheer arrogance. A man who’d dismiss a duke so summarily was either brave or sorely misguided, possibly both.
And a man who’d disrespect Constance deserved transportation.
“Your Grace?” Constance said, resuming the place beside Robert. “Are you well?”
“Of course he’s well,” Shaw said. “In the prime of life and thinking his consequence would be enough to blind me to my Christian duty. I have asked you both to leave, and as Ivy’s uncle, I warn you that further meddling in the girl’s life will not be permitted.”
Say something. Do something.
Constance put a hand on Robert’s arm. “Rothhaven?”
Robert managed a nod, but from the worry in Constance’s eyes, he knew his lapse had been obvious to her.
“Must I toss you from the premises bodily?” Shaw asked. “Our discussion is at an end.”
Stand. Stand on your own two feet, and say something sensible. With Constance’s aid, Robert rose.
“Matthew, chapter 22, verse 39,” Robert said. “…and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Lady Constance seeks a chance to show her daughter the love of a mother who is far from perfect, but who has never faltered in her attempts to do the right thing by her only daughter. Who or what is it you love, Reverend, when you keep a mother and daughter apart, and drag that child away to someplace she doesn’t want to go, the better to further your own ambitions?”
Robert had spoken slowly and carefully, his voice flatter than normal, and the result was a tone more arrogant than he’d intended.
Shaw lowered his arms. “How dare you? How dare you both? I could demand coin of you, I could threaten you with scandal, I could have called the magistrate on you for even approaching Ivy, and this is how you respond to reasonable reservations on my part? You insult me in my own home, and I have had enough. Mrs. Hodges, show them out. Now.”
Constance was as pale as funeral lilies, though she appeared composed. “Rothhaven, let’s be going, shall we?”
She kept her hand on Robert’s arm, though she was escorting him more than he was escorting her. Constance was at the front door tying her bonnet ribbons when Ivy came thundering down the steps.
“You can’t leave like this!” she said, throwing her arms around Constance. “I don’t want to go to blasted Australia, and Uncle is wrong to toss you out.”
Mrs. Hodges passed Robert his hat. “You’d best leave, Your Grace, my lady. The reverend might eventually calm down, but not if he thinks you’ve provoked the young miss to outright disobedience.”
Robert braced one hand on the newel post and used the other to tap his hat onto his head. “If her ladyship writes to Ivy, can you see that the letter reaches her?”
“I will try, Your Grace. Ivy, for the