Moreover, the poor mother was jealous of even the nurse who lavished loving nonsense upon her baby, and intensely jealous of the grandmother, for whom the baby, even thus early in his life, began to exhibit a perverse fondness.
The entire situation was a surprise, and, it must be admitted, an added blow to Ruth. Instead of being able to rejoice that the maternal instinct had been at last awakened in this woman, she was dismayed and heartsick over it. If Irene meant to begin thus early to keep the boy under her constant care and surveillance, what hope was there for his future?
She awakened to the fact that she had been counting upon this mother's fondness for all sorts of social functions, and expecting to see her enter with zest upon her former care-free life, thus making it possible for the baby to be much under his grandmother's supervision. She had planned prematurely. Irene seemed to have forgotten society; she never walked, or drove, without her baby; she kept him with her during all his waking moments, and apparently lived for the purpose of warding off the attentions of, especially, his grandmother.
In vain did Ruth try, by utmost deference to the mother's superior claim, by never presuming to offer even a suggestion as to the child's care, to disarm the intense dislike that Irene could not help showing--a dislike of having her even notice the child.
So marked was this condition of things becoming to the servants that Ruth, beyond measure distressed and bewildered, stayed much of the time in her own room, and considered and abandoned a dozen schemes for going away again. The difficulty was to make any movement that would not excite Erskine's suspicion; for Erskine, being a man and a very busy one, continued to be what Irene once told him he was, "as blind as a bat." He was a very proud, glad father, prepared to believe that his son was the sweetest, brightest, most beautiful baby who ever blessed the earth with his presence, and he was unequivocally and blissfully happy at seeing that baby in his grandmother's arms. In rejoicing over her home-coming, and in delighting over the thought of having his son grow up in daily intimacy with her, he said "we" as heartily and jubilantly as though certain that Irene shared his happiness, and it is certain that he so believed.