_)
Fitzgerald.
This Gyp's _awfully_ good. Who is he, eh?
Vane.
(_with patient scorn_) A woman!
Fitzgerald.
(_with conviction_) To be sure! That makes it--splendid! (_Chuckles
to himself, sits again on sofa, and goes on reading._)
Vane.
(_looking at picture_) Will you never learn to be an _artist_,
Denham? The modern picture should be a painted quatrain, with
colours for words--words which say nothing, because everything has
been said, but which _suggest_ all that has been felt and dreamed.
Art is the initiation into a mood, a mystery--a sphinx whose riddle
every one can answer, yet no one understand.
Fitzgerald.
(_shutting the book on his finger_) Bravo, Vane! 'Pon my word, I
begin to believe in you.
Vane.
I can endure even that.
Denham.
I am on the wrong tack then?
Vane.
My dear fellow, look at that canvas. What a method! You are like an
amateur pianist who tries laboriously to obtain tone, without having
mastered the keyboard. One cannot _blunder_ into great art. Only
Englishmen make the attempt. You are a nation of amateurs. (_He
turns away, and sees a sketch on the_ L _wall_) Did you do
this?
Denham.
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