Daily now, by the doctor's advice, Baby was taken to his mother's room for a few minutes. At first, Ruth sent the little maid with him, and avoided going in at the same time, lest the baby's demonstrations of delight over her would annoy his mother. But one morning as she was passing through the hall with Baby in her arms, the door of the sick room opened, and Rebecca called:--
"Mrs. Burnham, will you please bring Baby here a minute? His mother wants to see him."
So Ruth turned at once and carried him to the bedside, where he, being in genial mood, chose to smile upon and coo at his mother.
"He grows rapidly, doesn't he?" Irene said, and it was the first remark she had volunteered, directed to her mother-in-law.
Ruth had seen her twice a day ever since there had been any admittance for other than those in constant attendance, but her visits had necessarily been very brief, and there had been no attempt at conversation.
"Yes, indeed!" she made haste to say. "He is growing finely; you will be astonished to find how strong he is, and he seems to be perfectly well."
"He does you credit." His mother's tone was listlessness personified. Ruth, looking at her closely, began to realize that some strange change which seemed not to be accounted for by illness had come upon Irene. It was not simply that the fierceness of her love for her child was gone, and almost if not quite indifference taken its place, physical weakness might account for that; but there was an indescribable something about her that seemed to Ruth like a surrender, as one who had made a fierce fight and been worsted in the battle and had given up. The troubled grandmother thought it all over after she and baby were back in his room. She could not but fear that a new distress was coming upon them. What if Irene were that abnormal creature, a woman who could not continue to love a child, even her own! There was no fear that she would again desert it, her evident and unfailing, even increasing passion for her husband would hold her, this time, to her home; but--could the misery of it be borne, if this baby must grow up under the control of an unloving mother? She strained him to her so suddenly and so closely that he rebelled, and got off a lovely jargon of talk in protest.