"Like yourself?"
"Like the women of Veronese. (Of course I shall have to admit that I do not need this process. Unfortunately, I love it.) But those Veronese pictures, Mr. Blake—after all, what do they tell us? Blue sky and balconies, feasts and brocades, pages and dogs, colors and splendor, and those great fair women, with no expression in their faces—what does it all mean?"
"Simply beauty."
"Beauty without mind, then."
"A picture does not need mind. But, to be worth anything, beauty it must have."
"I don't know; a picture is a sort of companion. One of those pictures would not be that; you might as well have a beautiful idiot."
"Ah, but a picture is silent," replied Blake.
Claudia laughed. "You are incorrigible." Then, going back to her first subject, "I wish Mrs. Lenox would come here more," she said.
"You think she needs this enriching process you have suggested?"
"In one way—yes. All this beauty here in Venice is so much to her husband; while she—is forever with that child!"