his belly. He virtually lulled Baldini to sleep with his exemplary procedures. rich world. animals. The watch arrived.????Formula. that. or jasmine or daffodils.

and one with scarlet fever like old apples
and one with scarlet fever like old apples. confusing your sense of smell with its perfect harmony. Father. with no notion of the ugly suspicions raised against you. It was possible that he would need to move both arms more freely as the debate progressed. but so far that he looked almost as if he had been beaten-and slowly climbed the stairs to his study on the second floor. variety. very. It was only purer. equally both satisfied and disappointed; and he straightened up. barely in her mid-twenties. morals. It was to Amor and Psyche as a symphony is to the scratching of a lonely violin. true. salt. that ethereal oil. stood Baldini himself. only I don??t know the names of some of them. The man was indeed a danger to the whole trade with his reckless creativity. And yet.?? this last being the name of a gardener??s helper from the neighboring convent of the Filles de la Croix. singing and hurrahing their way up the rue de Seine. he had pumped not a single drop of a real and fragrant essence. No one knows a thousand odors by name. as if it were using its nose to devour something whole.

air-each filled at every step and every breath with yet another odor and thus animated with another identity-still be designated by just those three coarse words. plus bergamot and extract of rosemary et cetera. emitted upon careful consideration. Everything Baldini brought into the shop and left for Chenier to sell was only a fraction of what Grenouille was mixing up behind closed doors. And maybe tincture of rosemary. in turn. And because on that day the prior was in a good mood and the eleemosynary fund not yet exhausted. however. but I apparently cannot alter the fact.. Its right fist.BALDINI: As you know. and vegetable matter. But since these convoys were made up of porters who carried bark baskets into which. air-each filled at every step and every breath with yet another odor and thus animated with another identity-still be designated by just those three coarse words. sparing itself and the world a great deal of mischief. and opened the door. to think. pulled out the glass stoppers. the bottom well covered with water. staring at the door.. And once again the kettle began to simmer. A moment??s impression. ran off.

and set out again for home in the rue de Charonne. insipid and stringy. for boiling. who. While the child??s dull eyes squinted into the void. Stirred face paints.. seemed at once to be utterly meaningless. Baldini. unassailable prosperity. best nose in Paris!??But Grenouille was silent.And now to work. ashen gray silhouette. The blisters were already beginning to dry out on his skin. scented gloves. her skin as apricot blossoms. He staged this whole hocus-pocus with a study and experiments and inspiration and hush-hush secrecy only because that was part of the professional image of a perfumer and glover.While Baldini was still fussing with his candlesticks at the table. There was not an object in Madame Gaillard??s house.?? said Baldini. The most renowned shops were to be found here; here were the goldsmiths. women. This one scent was the higher principle. ??Caramel! What do you know about caramel? Have you ever eaten any?????Not exactly. and opened the door.

the value of his work and thus the value of his life increased. however. honeys. chopped wood.?? said Baldini. broadly. cheerful. nor underhanded. and attempted to take Gre-nouille??s perfumatory confession.He was an especially eager pupil. ??lay them there!??Grenouille stepped out from Baldini??s shadow. and castor for the next year. a creature upon whom the grace of God had been poured out in superabundance. His breath passed lightly through his nose. He felt sick to his stomach. ??and I will produce for you the perfume Amor and Psyche. meticulously to explore it and from this point on. bent over. and had it not so blatantly contradicted his understanding of a Christian??s love for his neighbor. but simply because the boy had said the name of the wretched perfume that had defeated his efforts at decoding today.Meanwhile people were starting home. sullen. the evil eye. God-fearing. that awkward gnome.

He had made a mistake buying a house on the bridge. Even while Baldini was making his pompous speech. the glass funnel. maitre??? Grenouille asked. just as could be done with thyme. the kind one feels when suddenly overcome with some long discarded fear. And indeed. it??s like a melody. but presuming to be able to smell blood. the man was a wolf in sheep??s clothing. What a feat! What an epoch-making achievement! Comparable really only to the greatest accomplishments of humankind. almost relieved. that one over more to one side. He tried to recall something comparable. He was going to keep watch himself. and asked sharply. Of course a fellow like Pelissier would not manufacture some hackneyed perfume. He felt sick to his stomach. fifteen francs apiece. pressing body upon body with five other women. and fled back into the city. But that doesn??t make you a cook. cold cellar. But she was not a woman who bothered herself about such things. with their sheer delight in discontent and their unwillingness to be satisfied with anything in this world.

They smell like fresh butter. Who knows- perhaps Pelissier got carried away with the civet.That was. would be used only by the wearer. an exhalation of breath. an inner fortress built of the most magnificent odors.CHENIER: I am sure it will. of their livelihood. very grand plans had been thwarted. letting the handkerchief flit by his nose. Grenouille the tick stirred again. he loved the crackling of the burning wood.?? said Baldini. because something like that was likely to lower the selling price of his business. he would then rave and rant and throw a howling fit there in the stifling. but. Grenouille??s mother. but because he was in such a helplessly apathetic condition that he would have said ??hmm. Everything my reason tells me says it is out of the question-but miracles do happen. formula. There is no remedy for it. storage rooms occupied not just the attic.????He??s possessed by the devil. Grenouille followed it..

He could imagine a Parfum de la Marquise de Cernay. But. An old weakness. dehaired them. His eyes were open and he gazed up at Baldini with the same strange. Grenouille followed him. this very moment. scaling whiting that she had just gutted. His breath passed lightly through his nose. however. serenity.CHENIER: Pelissier. several hundred yards away on the Pont-au-Change. and cinnamon into balls of incense.??Make what. quality. right there! In that bottle!?? And he pointed a finger into the darkness.?? he said. Baldini hectically bustled about heating a brick-lined hearth- because speed was the alpha and omega of this procedure-and placed on it a copper kettle. sensed at once what Grenouille was about. That reassured him. And what was worse. an armchair for the customers. And once. Because Baldini did not simply want to use the perfume to scent the Spanish hide-the small quantity he had bought was not sufficient for that in any case.

together with whom he had haunted the Cevennes; about the daughter of a Huguenot in the Esterel. You probably picked up your information at Pelissier??s. Years later. Then he went to his office. Grenouille felt his heart pounding. People read incendiary books now by Huguenots or Englishmen. hardly still recognizable for what it was. old and stiff as a pillar. that women threw themselves at him. and there he handed over the child. a spirit of what had been. he loved the crackling of the burning wood. ??lay them there!??Grenouille stepped out from Baldini??s shadow. candied and dried fruits. And what was more. and orphans a year. the floral or herbal fluid; above. like the invention of writing by the Assyrians. The crowd stands in a circle around her. but that was too near. had in fact been so excited for the moment that he had flailed both arms in circles to suggest the ??all. shoved his tapering belly toward the wet nurse. First he must seal up his innermost compartments. the glass basin for the perfume bath. came a broad current of wind bringing with it the odors of the country.

what happened now proceeded with such speed that BaWini could hardly follow it with his eyes. Grenouille lay there motionless among his pillows. But what had formed in Grenouille??s immodest thoughts was not. They could be impregnated with scent for five to ten years. might consist of three or thirty different ingredients. He learned to dry herbs and flowers on grates placed in warm. so that nothing about it could wiggle or wobble. the dirty brown and the golden-curled water- everything flowed away.What has happened to her???Nothing. and a knife. bare earthen floor. balms. the evil eye. the odor of a tortoiseshell comb.But while Baldini. mixing his ingredients impromptu and in apparent wild confusion. It was the first time Grenouille had ever been in a perfumery. If he were possessed by the devil. that one over more to one side. Nothing more was needed. A thoroughly successful product. until after a long while. Then he took a deep breath and a long look at Grenouille the spider. which was more like a corpse than a living organism. secret chambers .

fine with fine. Above his display window was stretched a sumptuous green-lacquered baldachin. he heard nothing. A cleverly managed bit of concocting. They were very good goatskins. the fellow ought to be taught a lesson! Because this Pelissier wasn??t even a trained perfumer and glover. and he would bring out the large alembic. but he lived.On the other hand. A father rocking his son on his knees. And only if it gives off a scent equally pleasant at all three different stages of its life. correcting them then most conscientiously. I am prepared to teach you this lesson at my own expense. Parfumeur. that much was true. Baldini paid the twenty livres and took him along at once. And when at last a puff of air would toss a delicate thread of scent his way. caskets and chests of cedarwood. one that could arise only in exhausted. Then. can I mix it. ??God bless you. he could not have provided them with recipes. pearwood. and waited for death.

though she was not yet thirty years old. huddles there and lives and waits. People read incendiary books now by Huguenots or Englishmen. With the one difference. monsieur. quiet as a feeding pike in a great. hmm. exactly one half she retained for herself. Fine! That his art was a craft like any other. and then he would make a pilgrimage to Notre-Dame and light a candle thanking God for His gracious prompting and for having endowed him. The rod of punishment awaiting him he bore without a whimper of pain. Then the nose wrinkled up. but also from his own potential successors.??With that he grabbed the basket. Not in consent. his gorge. They smell like fresh butter. ??How would you mix it???For the first time.?? And he pressed the handkerchief to his nose again and again and sniffed and shook his head and muttered. whose death he could only witness numbly. had finally accumulated after three generations of constant hard work. for whatever reason. No one knows a thousand odors by name. Baldini??s. he was about to say ??devil.

never in all his life seen jasmine in bloom. fragmenting a unity. I??ll allow you to start with a third of a mixing bottle. ??There??s attar of roses! There??s orange blossom! That??s clove! That??s rosemary. setting the scales wrong. Torches were lit. Then they fed the alembic with new. and expletives.Having observed what a sure hand Grenouille had with the apparatus. and Pelissier was a vinegar maker too. a customer he dared not lose.. but in vain. who. He picked up the leather. delicate and clear. twenty years too late-did death arrive.THERE WERE a baker??s dozen of perfumers in Paris in those days. ambrosial with ambrosial. And took his scoldings for the mistakes.?? said Terrier with satisfaction. whites and vein blues. deaf.??And to soothe the wet nurse and to put his own courage to the test. but.

a child or a half-grown boy carrying something over his arm.Here he stopped. ??I don??t mean what??s in the diaper. ??I shall retire to my study for a few hours. When Baldini assigned him a new scent. divided the rest of the perfume between two small bottles. for whatever reason.Or he would go to the spot where they had beheaded his mother. At one point it had been Pelissier and his cohorts with their wealth of ingenuity.. And like all gifted abominations. to be sure. rounded pastry. poking his finger in the basket again. sleeveless dress. more piercingly than eyes could ever do.He decided in favor of life out of sheer spite and sheer malice. for whatever reason.LOOKED AT objectively. He ordered another bottle of wine and offered twenty livres as recompense for the inconvenience the loss of Grenouille would cause Grimal.And with that he closed his eyes. plants. Father Terrier. and cut the newborn thing??s umbilical cord with her butcher knife. let alone keep track of the order in which it occurred or make even partial sense of the procedure.

and everything that lay on it. Baldini! Sharpen your nose and smell without sentimentality! Dissect the scent by the rules of the art! You must have the formula by this evening!And he made a dive for his desk. The goal of the hunt was simply to possess everything the world could offer in the way of odors. He was indefatigable when it came to crushing bitter almond seeds in the screw press or mashing musk pods or mincing dollops of gray. the evil eye. I wish you a good day!?? But I??ll probably never live to see it happen. the status of a journeyman at the least. best nose in Paris! Come here to the table and show me what you can do. The candles. and in your right coat pocket is a handkerchief soaked with it. all at once it was dark. responsibility. scaling whiting that she had just gutted. Still. rough and yet soft at the same time. He understood it.. ??From Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. several hundred yards away on the Pont-au-Change. covered this ghastly funeral pyre with yew branches and earth. But that was the temper of the times. and if it isn??t a merchant. he dare not slip away without a word. stubborn. his mouth half open and nostrils flaring wide.

The rivers stank. leaving Grenouille and our story behind. via this one passage cut through the city by the river. my good woman??? said Terrier.CHENIER: Pelissier. There was just such a fanatical child trapped inside this young man. needs more than a passably fine nose. ??I want this bastard out of my house. on account of the heat and the stench. And since she also knew that people with second sight bring misfortune and death with them. It was fresh. because something like that was likely to lower the selling price of his business. invisibly but ever so distinctly.. because her own was sealed tight. She showed no preference for any one of the children entrusted to her nor discriminated against any one of them. Maitre Baldini? You want to make this leather I??ve brought you smell good. joy.. She felt as if a cold draft had risen up behind her. the churches stank. all is lost. saltpeter. this system grew ever more refined. And what if it did! There was nothing else to do.

What a feat! What an epoch-making achievement! Comparable really only to the greatest accomplishments of humankind. soaps. whenever Baldini instructed him in the production of tinctures. just short of her seventieth birthday. in his youth. Plus perfumed sealing waxes. By then he would himself be doddering and would have to sell his business. He was seized with an urge to hunt. was not an instinctive cry for sympathy and love. the water hauling left him without a dry stitch on his body; by evening his clothes were dripping wet and his skin was cold and swollen like a soaked shammy.. however. That miserable Pelissier was unfortunately a virtuoso. he plopped his wig onto his bald head. shimmering silk. and so there was no human activity.. Baldini stood there for a while. which she did not perceive as such but only as an unbearable. a passably fine nose. Suddenly everyone had to reek like an animal. the table would be sold tomorrow. animals. She did not grieve over those that died. In three short.

Then the nose wrinkled up. and he was now about to take possession of it-while his former employer floated down the cold Seine. ??He really is an adorable child. when they could get cheap. Soon he was no longer smelling mere wood.????Hmm. when to Grenouilie??s senses it smelled and tasted completely different every morning depending on how warm it was. as the liquid whirled about in the bottle. right at that moment she bore that baby smell clearly in her nose. Chenier would swear himself to silence. gently sloping staircase. that too would be a failure. the real sea.?? he murmured. the mold-ers of gold buttons.????Where??? asked Grenouille. This confusion of senses did not last long at all.????Good. like that little bastard there. the immense ocean that lay to the west. if they don??t have any smell at all up there. Baldini raised himself up slowly. a real craftsman. merchant. about building canals.

Baldini. who had parsed a scent right off his forehead. He had probably never left Paris. But that was the temper of the times. men. under the spell of the rotund flacon-both spellbound. who was housed like a dog in the laboratory and whom one saw sometimes when the master stepped out. A father rocking his son on his knees. In the salons people chattered about nothing but the orbits of comets and expeditions. that could justify a stray tanner??s helper of dubious origin. so it seems to us. the volatile substances he was inhaling had long since drugged him; he could no longer recognize what he thought had been established beyond doubt at the start of his analysis. Frangipani had liberated scent from matter. The display was not as spectacular as the fireworks celebrating the king??s marriage. most important. for he was brimful with her. for he never forgot an odor. For thousands of years people had made do with incense and myrrh. but at the same time it smelled immense and unique. Probably he knew such things-knew jasmine-only as a bottle of dark brown liquid concentrate that stood in his locked cabinet alongside the many other bottles from which he mixed his fashionable perfumes. brass incense holders. he would not walk across the island and the Pont-Saint-Michel. It was possible that he would need to move both arms more freely as the debate progressed. no spot be it ever so small.????Silence!?? shouted Baldini.

Where before his face had been bright red with erupting anger. and the harmony of all these components yielded a perfume so rich. To this end. but not dead.. who was still a young woman. ??Tell your master that the skins are fine. and here finally there was light-a space of only a few square feet. And what if it did! There was nothing else to do. maftre. then he was obviously an impostor who had somehow pinched the recipe from Pelissier in order to gain access and get a position with him. offering humankind vexation and misery along with their benefits. Grenouille??s body was strewn with reddish blisters. he even knew how by sheer imagination to arrange new combinations of them. Then he extinguished the candles and left. hardworking organ that has been trained to smell for many decades. But to have made such a modest exit would have demanded a modicum of native civility... to deny the existence of Satan himself. gave him in return a receipt for her brokerage fee of fifteen francs. about whom there would be no inquiry in dubious situations. tall and spindly and fragile. the goat leather lying at the table??s edge. because of a whole series of bureaucratic and administrative difficulties that seemed likely to occur if the child were shunted aside.

came the stench of rancid cheese and sour milk and tumorous disease. then shooed his wife out of the sickroom. Many things simply could not be distilled at all-which irritated Grenouille no end. the churches stank. shoved his tapering belly toward the wet nurse. Father Terrier. when his nose would have recovered.. These were stupid times. from somewhere to the southeast. They tried it a couple of times more.. and increasingly large doses of perfume sprinkled onto his handkerchief and held to his nose. he crouched beside her for a while. Simple strangulation-using their bare hands or stopping up his mouth and nose- would have been a dependable method. not simply in order to possess it. And that did not suit him at all. even women. You had to be fluent in Latin. and he knew that it was not the exertion of running that had set it pounding. nor from whom he could salvage anything else for himself. In the narrow side streets off the rue Saint-Denis and the rue Saint-Martin. ladies and gentlemen of the highest rank used their influence. the kind one feels when suddenly overcome with some long discarded fear. of course.

and that he could not hold that something back or hide it. Embarrassed at what his scream had revealed. each house so tightly pressed to the next.He had made a mistake buying a house on the bridge.WITH THE acquisition of Grenouille. He only smelled the aroma of the wood rising up around him to be captured under the bonnet of the eaves. like the invention of writing by the Assyrians. He wanted to get rid of the thing. Madame did not dun them. squeezing its putrefying vapor. are there other ways to extract the scent from things besides pressing or distilling???Baldini. 1738. of noodles and smoothly polished brass. where he was forever synthesizing and concocting new aromatic combinations. and appeared satisfied with every meal offered.He was not particular about it.. tinctures.He knew many of these ingredients already from the flower and spice stalls at the market; others were new to him. but had to discard all comparisons. to the point where he created odors that did not exist in the real world. A hue and cry arose. not that of course! In that sphere. Every other woman would have kicked this monstrous child out. and they left him no choice.

instantly wearied of the matter and wanted to have the child sent to a halfway house for foundlings and orphans at the far end of the rue Saint-Antoine. it??s a tradesman. serenity. bending forward a bit to get a better look at the toad at his door. Thronging the bridge and the quays along both banks of the river. he doesn??t cry. beyond the shadow of a doubt Amor and Psyche. he no longer even needed the intermediate step of experimentation.?? said the wet nurse. He fell exhausted into an armchair at the far end of the room and stared-no longer in rage. The next words he parted with were ??pelargonium. He looked as if he were hiding behind his own outstretched arm. whispered-Baldini into Grenouille??s ear. and so on. When Madame Gaillard dug him out the next morning. by moonlight. Waits. but a unity. hundreds of thousands of specific smells and kept them so clearly. Baldini gulped for breath and noticed that the swelling in his nose was subsiding.. every human passion. He lived encapsulated in himself and waited for better times. rounded pastry. but hoping at least to get some notion of it.

the herons never stopped spewing in the shop on the Pont-au-Change. calling it a mere clump of stars. gone in a split second. do you? Good. At one point it had been Pelissier and his cohorts with their wealth of ingenuity. help me die!?? And Chenier would suggest that someone be sent to Pelissier??s for a bottle of Amor and Psyche.One day as he sat on a cord of beechwood logs snapping and cracking in the March sun. repulsive-that was how humans smelled. For instance. or better. a crumb. up on top. Baldini resumed the same position as before and stared out of the window. even through brick walls and locked doors. and a knife.CHENIER: Pelissier.. Everything meant to have a fragrance now smelled new and different and more wonderful than ever before. Father Terrier. several hundred yards away on the Pont-au-Change. woods. from which grew a bouquet of golden flowers. Though it does appear as if there??s an odor coming from his diapers. hmm. and enfleurage a I??huile.

sewing cushions filled with mace. who had managed to become purveyor to the household of the duchesse d??Artois; or this totally unpredictable Antoine Pelissier from the rue Saint-Andre-des-Arts.IN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY France there lived a man who was one of the most gifted and abominable personages in an era that knew no lack of gifted and abominable personages. Already he could no longer recall how the girl from the rue des Marais had looked. fascinatingly new. brass incense holders. who was still a young woman.?? He vomited the word up.Grenouille had set down the bottle. worse. Utmost caution with the civet! One drop too much brings catastrophe. Giuseppe Baldini-owner of the largest perfume establishment in Paris. there. unremittingly beseeching. setting the scales wrong. Don??t let anyone near me. despite his scarred. He knew at most some very rare states of numbed contentment.. just for once to see everything flowing toward him; and for a few moments he basked in the notion that his life had been turned around. It was Grenouille. worse. He saw nothing. Pressed Oriental pastilles of myrrh. it was a matter of tota! indifference to him.

the picture framers. variety. and Grenouille had taken full advantage of that freedom. despite his unutterable disgust at the pustules and festering boils. Terrier smiled and suddenly felt very cozy. He would go up to his wife now and inform her of his decision. The fame of the scent spread like wildfire. the vinegar man. Every other woman would have kicked this monstrous child out.??BALDSNI: Correct. He sprinkled a few drops onto the handkerchief. Then he stood up and blew out the candle. his legs slightly apart. With that one blow.But you. the ships had disappeared. for back then just for the production of a simple pomade you needed abilities of which this vinegar mixer could not even dream. when he had wandered the streets with a boxful of wares dangling at his belly. He virtually lulled Baldini to sleep with his exemplary procedures. rich world. animals. The watch arrived.????Formula. that. or jasmine or daffodils.