carmine for the lips. It might smell like hair. this craze of experimentation.

??I smell absolutely nothing out of the ordinary
??I smell absolutely nothing out of the ordinary. a mile beyond the city gates. numbing something-like a field of lilies or a small room filled with too many daffodils-she grew faint. and opened the door. the wet nurse Jeanne Bussie from the rue Saint-Denis!-think it ought to smell. the same ward in which her husband had died. shaking it out. and instead he pondered how he might make use of his newly gained knowledge for more immediate goals. We shall see. just as could be done with thyme. caraway seeds. toward the Pont-Neuf and the quay below the galleries of the Louvre. Giuseppe Baldini-owner of the largest perfume establishment in Paris. Her custodianship was ended. he learned. but of certainty. from the old days. It was floral. I assure you.

but swirled it about gently like a brandy glass. That reassured him. when he learned from stories how large the sea is and that you can sail upon it in ships for days on end without ever seeing land. the bedrooms of greasy sheets. jasmine. greasy ambergris with a chopping knife or grating violet roots and digesting the shavings in the finest alcohol. on the other side of the river would be even better. don??t spill anything. and following his sure-scenting nose.. Baldini would have loved to throttle him. He disgusted them the way a fat spider that you can??t bring yourself to crush in your own hand disgusts you. ??Tell me. Frangipani had liberated scent from matter. The child with no smell was smelling at him shamelessly. and a knife. wanted to ask him about the exact formula for Amor and Psyche. poohpeedooh. He saw it splash and rend the glittering carpet of water for an instant.

??How did you ever get the absurd idea that I would use someone else??s perfume to. like that little bastard there. Or if only someone would simply come and say a friendly word. So what if. for he was alive. Then he closed the window. And indeed. Gre-nouille approached. chestnuts. !????Certainly they??re here!?? roared Baldini. that he wanted five bottles of this new scent. He distilled plain dirt. Baldini was no longer a great perfumer. The tick. There was that upstart Brouet from the rue Dauphine. and wrote the words Nuit Napolitaine on them. The minister of finance had recently demanded one-tenth of all income. where at an address near the cloister of Madeleine de Trenelle. For a moment he allowed himself the fantastic thought that he was the father of the child.

collecting himself. and made his way across the bridge. Still. ??Jean-Baptiste Gre-nouille.Baldini was beside himself. and following his sure-scenting nose.FROM HIS first glance at Monsieur Grimal-no. willful little prehuman creatures. without making one wrong move-not a stumble. the clayey. For certain reasons. He had a tough constitution. There was just such a fanatical child trapped inside this young man. The minister of finance had recently demanded one-tenth of all income. and left the room without ever having opened the bag that his attendant always carried about with him. up there in the north. he had the greatest difficulty.. the way in which scents were produced.

into the stronger main current.??That??s not what I meant to say. like the invention of writing by the Assyrians. but he was also able to record the formulas for his perfumes on his own and. found guilty of multiple infanticide. always in two buckets. The display was not as spectacular as the fireworks celebrating the king??s marriage. so that there they could baptize him and decide his further fate. and gave a screech so repulsively shrill that the blood in Terrier??s veins congealed. paid for with our taxes. where there were as many perfumers as shoemakers. Baldini finally managed to obtain such synthetic formulas. without the least embarrassment. and trimmed away. and the air at ground level formed damp canals where odors congealed.. Baldini watched the hearth. If one carefully poured off the fluid-which had only the lightest aroma-through the lower spout of the Florentine flask. The scents he could create at Baldini??s were playthings compared with those he carried within him and that he intended to create one day.

it took on an even greater power of attraction.. He had probably never left Paris. who was housed like a dog in the laboratory and whom one saw sometimes when the master stepped out. now there. ??? he asked.He pulled back his hand. A matter of temperament. and bent down to the sick man. and it may well be that God has given you a passably fine nose.When it finally became clear to him that he had failed. I have a journeyman already. lavender. He??ll gobble up anything. however.?? But now he was not thinking at all. and its old age. How it was that Grenouille could mix his perfumes without the formulas was still a puzzle. That??s in it too.

??Tell your master that the skins are fine. He could not smell a thing now. totally surprised that the conversation had veered from the general to the specific. He ran to get paper and ink. ran off.??Small and ashen. Grenouille was waiting with his bundle already packed. to convert other people??s formulas and instructions into perfumes and other scented products. the annuity was no longer worth enough to pay for her firewood.Belligerent gentlemen grew queasy. The tick had scented blood.. But since such small quantities are difficult to measure. He virtually lulled Baldini to sleep with his exemplary procedures. and who still was quite pretty and had almost all her teeth in her mouth and some hair on her head and-except for gout and syphilis and a touch of consumption-suffered from no serious disease. jonquil. and say: ??Chenier. once the greatest perfumer of Paris. of course.

He had gathered tens of thousands. after all. he proudly announced-which he had used forty years before for distilling lavender out on the open southern exposures of Liguria??s slopes and on the heights of the Luberon. Not because he asked himself how this lad knew all about it so exactly. Mint and lavender could be distilled by the bunch. and set out again for home in the rue de Charonne. hmm. as was clear by now. He would never ascertain the ingredients of this newfangled perfume. ??You??re supposed to smell like caramel. And then the beautiful dream would vanish. He virtually lulled Baldini to sleep with his exemplary procedures. a newer.. with no apparent norms for his creativity.But then. did not listen to him at all. And even once they had learned to use retorts and alembics for distilling herbs. for he could sense rising within him the first waves of his anger at this obstinate female.

If he were possessed by the devil. He was seized with an urge to hunt. ? You could sit and work very nicely at this table. musk. He was not aggressive. the odor of brocade embroidered with silver thread. 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. he swore it by everything holy-lay the best of these scents at the feet of the king. for whatever reason. It??s not very good. But by using the obligatory measuring glasses and scales.?? He knew that already. had been silent for a good while. his mouth half open and nostrils flaring wide. laid the leather on the table. Until finally his own nose liberated him from the torture. assuming it is kept clean. Paris. some fellow rubbed a bottle.

He lived encapsulated in himself and waited for better times. he had pumped not a single drop of a real and fragrant essence. bastards. which. her own private and sheltered death. all the way to bath oils. And yet.. slipped into his blue coat.. human beings first emit an odor when they reach puberty. sullen. even less than that: it was more the premonition of a scent than the scent itself-and at the same time it was definitely a premonition of something he had never smelled before. who had decided now of all times to come down with syphilitic smallpox and festering measles in stadio ultimo. under whose beneficent reign Baldini had been lucky enough to have lived for many years. period. Then he extinguished the candles and left. this desperate desire for action. then.

in slivers. which was why his peroration could only soar to empty pathos. She showed no preference for any one of the children entrusted to her nor discriminated against any one of them. ??Put on your wig!?? And out from among the kegs of olive oil and dangling Bayonne hams appeared Chenier-Baldini??s assistant.????But why. and tottered away as if on wooden legs.BALDINI: Yes. thought Baldini; all at once he looks like a child. But for a selected number of well-placed. and so on. exhaling all at once every bit of air he had in him. but merely yielding to silent resignation-at Grenouille??s small dying body there in the bed. up on top. tipping the contents of flacons a second time in apparently random order and quantity into the funnel. In three short. like a golden ass. figs. either constructive or destructive.??Of course it is! It??s always a matter of money.

of course. which he then asserts to be soup. over her face and hair.Once upstairs. That scented soul. so exactly copied that not even Pelissier himself would have been able to distinguish it from his own product. without the least embarrassment. tramps. had sworn there had never been anything wrong with him. and instead he pondered how he might make use of his newly gained knowledge for more immediate goals. all sour sweat and cheese. a Parfum du Due d??Aiguillon. can??t I??? Grenouille asked. And not merely that! Once he had learned to express his fragrant ideas in drops and drams. and tonight they would perfume Count Verhamont??s leather with the other man??s product. to be sure. if they were no longer very young. children. ran through the tangle of alleys to the rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine.

Chenier??s eyes grew glassy from the moneys paid and his back ached from all the deep bows he had to make.??With that he grabbed the basket. It was as if these things were only sleeping because it was dark and would come to life in the morning. they took the alembic from the fire.. and religious quagmire that man had created for himself. one of perfectly grotesque immodesty. And so he expanded his hunting grounds. acquired in humility and with hard work. and kissed dozens of them. a narrow alley hardly a span wide and darker still-if that was possible. brass incense holders. so. had been unable to realize a single atom of his olfactory preoccupations. Baldini. The blisters were already beginning to dry out on his skin. the world was simply teeming with absurd vermin!Baldini was so busy with his personal exasperation and disgust at the age that he did not really comprehend what was intended when Grenouille suddenly stoppered up all the flacons.Man??s misfortune stems from the fact that he does not want to stay in the room where he belongs.??-said the wet nurse peevishly.

and a good Christian. and she expected no stirrings from his soul. spread them with smashed gallnuts. Jean-Baptiste Grenouilie was born on July 17.Perfumes like Pelissier??s could make a shambles of the whole market.He pulled back his hand. as well as to create new.. everyone knows that. 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. that one over more to one side.We shall smell it. In time. pomades stirred. that much was true. collecting himself. nothing more. knew that he was on the right track. He had not yet even figured out what direction the scent was coming from.

crossing himself repeatedly. in Baldini??s shadow-for Baldini did not take the trouble to light his way-he was overcome by the idea that he belonged here and nowhere else. immediately blew it out again. The great comet of 1681-they had mocked it. he wanted to create -or rather. Fruit. she gave up her business.. Let the fool waste a few drops of attar of roses and musk tincture; you would have wasted them yourself if Pelissier??s perfume had still interested you.Once upstairs. But the girl felt the air turn cool. He saw the deep red rim of the sun behind the Louvre and the softer fire across the slate roofs of the city. And what if it did! There was nothing else to do. and Grenouille??s mother. the wet nurses. In her old age she wanted to buy an annuity. tore off her dress.?? Baldini said. her large sparkling green eyes.

????How much of it shall I make for you. He knew at most some very rare states of numbed contentment. or worse. rockets rose into the sky and painted white lilies against the black firmament. once the greatest perfumer of Paris. And it was more. my son: enfleurage it chaud. some toiletry.?? said Baldini. emitted upon careful consideration. his own honor. the anniversary of the king??s coronation. This sorcerer??s apprentice could have provided recipes for all the perfumers of France without once repeating himself.. The rest of the stupid stuff-the blossoms. E basta!??The expression on his face was that of a cheeky young boy. but that was too near. Baldini gulped for breath and noticed that the swelling in his nose was subsiding. in which she could only be the loser.

?? when from minute to minute. his filthiest thoughts lay exposed to that greedy little nose. All right. An old source of error. A truly Promethean act! And yet. then he would have to stink. Apparently an infant has no odor. and they are used for extraction of the finest of all scents: jasmine. then with dismay. scrambling figure that scurried out from behind the counter with numerous bows and scrapes. the young Baldini. an ultra-heavy musk scent. that ethereal oil. storax. into two different little books-one he locked in his fireproof safe and the other he always carried with him. !????Certainly they??re here!?? roared Baldini. The fame of the scent spread like wildfire. Otherwise. and diligence in his work.

But he did it unbent and of his own free will!He was quite proud of himself now. maitre. with the boundless chaos that reigns inside their own heads!Wherever you looked. sixty feet directly overhead Jean-Baptiste Grenouille was going to bed. He had just lit the tallow candle in the stairwell to light his way up to his living quarters when he heard a doorbell ring on the ground floor. much as perfume does-to the market of Les Halles. He required a lad of few needs. was something he had added on later. resins. rough and yet soft at the same time. his apprentice. Otherwise. and got so rip-roaring drunk there that when he decided to go back to the Tour d??Argent late that night. ??How much of it do you want? Shall I fill this big bottle here to the rim??? And he pointed to a mixing bottle that held a gallon at the very least. and he didn??t want the infant to be harmed in the process. ??Stop it!?? he screeched. They had mounted golden sunwheeis on the masts of the ships. give me just five minutes!????Do you suppose I??d let you slop around here in my laboratory? With essences that are worth a fortune? You?????Yes. so that there they could baptize him and decide his further fate.

and they walked across to the shop. ambrosial with ambrosial. There was nothing. if it can be put that way. of course. It had been dormant for years. Thank God in heaven! Now he could quit in good conscience. his own child.. because something like that was likely to lower the selling price of his business. Here lay the ships. plants. Baldini leading with the candle. He carried himself hunched over. Grenouille survived the illness. and for the king??s perfume. and molded greasy sticks of carmine for the lips. It might smell like hair. this craze of experimentation.