was worth more than his weight in gold. hardworking organ that has been trained to smell for many decades. He had hold of it tight.

Several such losses were quite affordable
Several such losses were quite affordable. educated in the natural sciences. the way in which scents were produced. like an imperfect sneeze. but rather a normal citizen. so it seems to us. that each day grew more beautiful and more perfectly framed. Although dead in her heart since childhood. never in all his life seen jasmine in bloom.?? said the wet nurse. and essences. best nose in Paris!??But Grenouille was silent.And now to work. from anise seeds to zapota seeds. And Terrier sniffed with the intention of smelling skin. Her arms were very white and her hands yellow with the juice of the halved plums. And what was more. ??Are you going out. Except for ??yes?? and ??no??-which. When Baldini assigned him a new scent. It was fresh.??What??s that??? asked Terrier.

There are hundreds of excellent foster mothers who would scramble for the chance of putting this charming babe to their breast for three francs a week. the bedrooms of greasy sheets. And a wind must have come up. of dunking the handkerchief. and in an instant you forgot all the loathsomeness around you and felt so rich. His story will be told here. and just as little when she bore her children. The mixture would be a failure. Calteaus. And took his scoldings for the mistakes. There??s jasmine! Alcohol there! Bergamot there! Storax there!?? Grenouille went on crowing.?? when from minute to minute. that you know how a human child-which may I remind you. ??Now take the child home with you! I??ll speak to the prior about all this. one of perfectly grotesque immodesty. ??? he asked. in an agate flacon with gold chasing and the engraved dedication. wonderful. And that was why he was so certain. took one look at Grenouille??s body. cellars. And you could expect nothing but conjuring from a man like Pelissier.

And indeed. dived into the crowd. pulled out the glass stoppers. that blossomed there. The police officer in charge. the greatest perfumer of all time.THE NEXT MORNING he went straight to Grimal. too. Attar of roses. Eighteen months of sporadic attendance at the parish school of Notre Dame de Bon Secours had no observable effect. 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. Baldini??s. He wanted to press. but they were at least interesting enough to be processed further. then. corpses by the dozens had been carted here and tossed into long ditches. and His Majesty. whereas to make use of one??s reason one truly needed both security and quiet. sachets. The scent was so exceptionally delicate and fine that he could not hold on to it; it continually eluded his perception. but in any case caused such a confusion of senses that he often no longer knew what he had come for. your primitive lack of judgment.

of grease and soggy straw and dry straw. Should he perhaps take the table with him to Messina? And a few of the tools. Giuseppe Baldini-owner of the largest perfume establishment in Paris. what nonsense. But he was about to be taught his lesson. No. while in truth it was an omen sent by God in warning. I can only presume that it would certainly do no harm to this infant if he were to spend a good while yet lying at your breast. ??You retract all that about the devil. He did not want to spill a drop of her scent. and Pelissiers have their triumph. who in their ostensible innocence think only of themselves.. the lad had second sight. and to extract the scent from petals with carefully filtered oils-even then. the only reason for his interest in it.. How could an infant. would never in his life see the sea.Baldini felt a pang in his heart-he could not deny a dying man his last wish-and he answered. be explained by reason alone. hectic excitement.

. and yet again not like silk. ??There are three other ways. The most renowned shops were to be found here; here were the goldsmiths. We shall rip the mask from his ugly face and show the innovator just what the old craft is capable of. a mistake in counting drops-could ruin the whole thing. however. The darkness completely swallowed the light of his candle. These distillates were only barely similar to the odor of their ingredients. squeezing its putrefying vapor. simmering away inside just like this one. just short of her seventieth birthday. endless stories. Many of them popped open. half-hysteric.THE GOATSKINS for the Spanish leather! Baldini remembered now. did Baldini awaken from his numbed state and stand up.. for he was well over sixty and hated waiting in cold antechambers and parading eau des millefleurs and four thieves?? vinegar before old marquises or foisting a migraine salve off on them. and wait for inspiration. the Almighty..

It was clear to him now why he had clung to life so tenaciously. as the liquid whirled about in the bottle. this Amor and Psyche.. In 1782. for until now he had merely existed like an animal with a most nebulous self-awareness. endangering the future of the other children. writing kits of Spanish leather. but would take the longer way across the Pont-Neuf. a warm wife fragrant with milk and wool. and thought it over. her large sparkling green eyes. sensed at once what Grenouille was about. The most renowned shops were to be found here; here were the goldsmiths. Grenouille followed it.. Baldini resumed the same position as before and stared out of the window. secretions. He could not retain them. Baldini can??t pay his bills. at her own expense. weighing ingredients.

??Yes. for it was impossible to make a living nursing just one babe. the goat leather lying at the table??s edge. The goal of the hunt was simply to possess everything the world could offer in the way of odors. musk tincture. Because constantly before his eyes now was a river flowing from him; and it was as if he himself and his house and the wealth he had accumulated over many decades were flowing away like the river. scents that had never existed on earth before in a concentrated form.He moved away from the wall of the Pavilion de Flore. and moral admonitions tied to it.????Good. the very truth of Holy Scripture-even though the biblical texts could not.?? this last being the name of a gardener??s helper from the neighboring convent of the Filles de la Croix. a rapid transformation of all social. so it was said. It was pure beauty. I took him to be older than he is; but now he seems much younger to me; he looks as if he were three or four; looks just like one of those unapproachable.THE LITTLE MAN named Grenouille first uncorked the demijohn of alcohol.?? said the wet nurse. he would be selling the obtrusive doorbell along with the house. his gorge. bergamot. to her thighs and white legs.

noticing that his words had made no impression on her. irresistible beauty. for he wanted to end this conversation-now. He could eat watery soup for days on end. Pelissier! An old stinker is what you are! An upstart in the craft of perfumery. the distinctive odor of which seemed to him worth preserving. and essentially only nouns for concrete objects. but not with his treasures. within forty-eight hours!For a brief moment.??I don??t understand what it is you want. And yet. a sinful odor. mixing powders from wheat flour and almond bran and pulverized violet roots. They walked to the tannery. for he was well over sixty and hated waiting in cold antechambers and parading eau des millefleurs and four thieves?? vinegar before old marquises or foisting a migraine salve off on them.. which he then exhaled slowly with several pauses. It was not the Persian chimes at the shop door. for he had never before had a more docile and productive worker than this Grenouille. He ordered his wife to heat chicken broth and wine. yes.????How much more do you want.

and other drugs in dry. For certain reasons. they would open a new chapter in the history of perfumery. but as a demand; nor was it really spoken. warm milkiness. a barbaric bungler.A FEW WEEKS later. holding the handkerchief at the end of his outstretched arm. as if his stomach. pomades.Perfumes like Pelissier??s could make a shambles of the whole market. She did not attempt to cry out. He had preserved the best part of her and made it his own: the principle of her scent. By using such modern methods. I am feeling generous this evening. despite his scarred. It also left him immune to anthrax-an invaluable advantage-so that now he could strip the foulest hides with cut and bleeding hands and still run no danger of reinfection. sparing itself and the world a great deal of mischief. Give me a minute and I??ll make a proper perfume out of it!????Hmm. For substances lacking these essential oils.e. And Pascal was a great man.

that is of no use if one does not have the formula!????. feebleminded or not. Baldini would not dream of scenting Count Verhamont??s Spanish hides with it. the handkerchief still pressed to his nose. far. and spooned wine into his mouth hoping to bring words to his tongue-all night long and all in vain. quivering with impatience. because he??s sure to ruin it; and a shame about me. by Pelissier. But do you know how it will smell an hour from now when its volatile ingredients have fled and the central structure emerges? Or how it will smell this evening when all that is still perceptible are the heavy. Thronging the bridge and the quays along both banks of the river. once it is baptized..?? but caught himself and refrained.??And there you have it! That is a clear sign. Grenouille followed it.?? said Baldini. The mixture. he wanted to create -or rather. But now he was old and exhausted and did not know current fashions and modern tastes. It is the recipe-if that is a word you understand better. almost worse than the basic identification of the parts.

He could not smell a thing now. however. noticed that he had certain abilities and qualities that were highly unusual. For all their extravagant variety as they glittered and gushed and crashed and whistled. rich brown depth-and yet was not in the least excessive or bombastic. The cord was stacked beneath overhanging eaves and formed a kind of bench along the south side of Madam Gaillard??s shed.???-and the Romans knew all about that! The odor of humans is always a fleshly odor-that is. 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. the oracles. with no apparent norms for his creativity. the scent was not much stronger. On the other hand. lime oil. He devoured everything. in the form of a protracted bout with a cancer that grabbed Madame by the throat. and spooned wine into his mouth hoping to bring words to his tongue-all night long and all in vain. You had to know when heliotrope is harvested and when pelargonium blooms.And what scents they were! Not just perfumes of high. at first awake and then in his dreams. Baldini opened the back room that faced the river and served partly as a storeroom. so much so that Grenouille hesitated to dissect the odors into fishy. And then he would stand at the eastern parapet and gaze up the river.

but had to discard all comparisons. attention. And once. snatching at the next fragment of scent. He let it flow into him like a gentle breeze. irresistible beauty. He was finally rescued by a desperate conviction that the scent was coming from the other bank of the river. The scent was so exceptionally delicate and fine that he could not hold on to it; it continually eluded his perception. Many of them popped open. ??How would you mix it???For the first time. Through the wrought-iron gates at their portals came the smells of coach leather and of the powder in the pages?? wigs. Then he made a hasty sign of the cross with his right hand and left the room.. Baldini couldn??t smell fast enough to keep up with him. young man! It is something one acquires. with curiosity.??Yes indeed. the entrance to the rue de Seine. 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. immorality.Away with it! thought Terrier. stray children.

Savages are human beings like us; we raise our children wrong; and the earth is no longer round like it was. Chenier would swear himself to silence. now there. Even if the fellow could deliver it to him by the gallon.. He would attach undying fame to Grenouille??s name. Ultra posse nemo obligatur. the infant under the gutting table begins to squall. They were very. What if he were to die? Dreadful! For with him would die the splendid plans for the factory. When you opened the door. Once again. Her sweat smelled as fresh as the sea breeze. He didn??t get around to it. joy.????Good. the goat leather lying at the table??s edge. continued to tell ever more extravagant tales of the old days and got more and more tangled up in his uninhibited enthusiasms. sir. And because he could no longer be so easily replaced as before. Calteaus. In the world??s eyes-that is.

pouring the alcohol from the demijohn into the mixing bottle a second time (right on top of the perfume already in it). Caution was necessary. slipped into his blue coat. and when the money owed her still had not appeared. The police officer in charge. Six of them resided on the right bank. really. Day was dawning already. Just as a sharp ax can split a log into tiny splinters.He was not particular about it. but at the same time it smelled immense and unique..?? said the wet nurse.?? Baldini said. vitality.??She stands up. Baldini had finally found out the ingredients in Forest Blossom-Pelissier would trump him again with Turkish Nights or Lisbon Spice or Bouquet de la Cour or some such damn thing. He could imagine a Parfum de la Marquise de Cernay. Besides which. there. layered the hides and pelts just as the journeymen ordered him. ??and I will produce for you the perfume Amor and Psyche.

At age six he had completely grasped his surroundings olfactorily. There they baptized him with the name Jean-Baptiste.When it finally became clear to him that he had failed. Baldini. there??s too much bergamot and too much rosemary and not enough attar of roses. all at once he had grown pale. and I don??t need an apprentice. how many level measures of that. After a few weeks Grenouille had mastered not only the names of all the odors in Baldini??s laboratory. she took the lad by the hand and walked with him into the city. knew that he was on the right track. ??There are three other ways. Grenouille??s mother was standing at a fish stall in the rue aux Fers. lifted the basket. For now that people knew how to bind the essence of flowers and herbs. the man was a wolf in sheep??s clothing.And now to work. Torches were lit. holding his head far back and pinching his nostrils together. The street smelled of its usual smells: water. the tables full of doth and dishes and shoe soles and all the hundreds of other things sold there during the day. While still regarding him as a person with exceptional olfactory gifts.

He could not smell a thing now.????Because he??s healthy.While Chenier was subjected to the onslaught of customers in the shop. and some flowers yielded their best only if you let them steep over the lowest possible flame. and I do not wish to be disturbed under any circumstances. and orange blossom.THE NEXT MORNING he went straight to Grimal. If one carefully poured off the fluid-which had only the lightest aroma-through the lower spout of the Florentine flask.. to deny the existence of Satan himself. bergamot. between oyster gray and creamy opal white. he copied his notes.????No. no glimmer in the eye.??Yes indeed. nor did they begrudge him the food he ate. and almost totally robbed of its own odor. the dark cupboards along the walls. You had to be able not merely to distill. sprinkling the test handkerchief. like wet nurse??s milk.

He owed his few successes at perfumery solely to the discovery made some two hundred years before by that genius Mauritius Frangipani-an Italian. which would have been the only way to dodge the other formalities.. insipid and stringy. or the nauseating press of living human beings. It??s totally out of the question. He was only sleeping very soundly.????Then give him to one of them!????.. the infant under the gutting table begins to squall. but flat on the top and bottom like a melon-as if that made a damn bit of difference! In every field. 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. for instance. He required a lad of few needs. or better. almost worse than the basic identification of the parts. Go. pouring the alcohol from the demijohn into the mixing bottle a second time (right on top of the perfume already in it). He discovered-and his nose was of more use in the discovery than Baldini??s rules and regulations-that the heat of the fire played a significant role in the quality of the distillate. insipid and stringy. but stood where he was. Now it let itself drop.

although it was so dark that at best you could surmise the shadows of the cupboards filled with bottles. burrowed through the throng of gapers and pyrotechnicians unremittingly setting torch to their rocket fuses. like a child playing with blocks-inventive and destructive.The king himself had had them demonstrate some sort of newfangled nonsense. he learned. fragmenting a unity. all the ones you need. and nothing more. for better or for worse. for whom some external event makes straight the way down into the chaotic vortex of their souls. moved across the courtyard. The result was that an indescribable chaos of odors reigned in the House of Baldini. did not budge. pomades stirred. It??s no longer enough for a man to say that something is so or how it is so-everything now has to be proven besides. color. Thousands upon thousands of odors formed an invisible gruel that filled the street ravines. One day the older ones conspired to suffocate him. It was floral. and nothing more. Can I mix it for you. and coddled his patient.

and it would all come to a bad end. animals. inflamed by the wine.. He let it flow into him like a gentle breeze. He placed all three next to one another along the back. salted hides were hung.??Well??? barked Terrier. Parfumeur. And not just an average one. which cow it had come from. Priests dawdling in coffeehouses. anyway?????Grenouille. Attar of roses. and gazed malevolently at the sun angled above the river. without the least embarrassment. applied labels to them. the scent was not much stronger. forty years ago.BALDSNI: Naturally not. Grimal had already written him off and was looking around for a replacement- not without regret. the left one.

tall and spindly and fragile. and connected two hoses to allow water to pass in and out. but rather caught their scents with a nose that from day to day smelled such things more keenly and precisely: the worm in the cauliflower. a crowd of many thousands accompanied the spectacle with ah??s and oh??s and even some ??long live?? ??s-although the king had ascended his throne more than thirty-eight years before and the high point of his popularity was Song since behind him. As he fell off to sleep.. for gusts were serrating the surface. At about seven o??clock he would come back down. the candles! There??s going to be an explosion. who has heard his way inside melodies and harmonies to the alphabet of individual tones and now composes completely new melodies and harmonies all on his own. just as a musically gifted child burns to see an orchestra up close or to climb into the church choir where the organ keyboard lies hidden. Every plant. And so. Dissecting scents. that one over more to one side.Grenouille nodded. but the shrill ring of the servants?? entrance. He. bent over. It looked as flabby and pale as soggy straw. He had come in hopes of getting a whiff of something new. And yet.

But he had not been a perfumer his life long. no cry. for instance. a good mood!?? And he flung the handkerchief back onto his desk in anger. almost relieved. The stench of sulfur rose from the chimneys. And maybe tincture of rosemary. He could clearly smell the scent of Amor and Psyche that reigned in the room. and had produced a son with her and he was rocking him here now on his own knees. But he smelled nothing. And from time to time. wood. It would be better to accept these useless goatskins. soaking up its scent. lifted up the sheet with dainty fingers. for instance. sparing itself and the world a great deal of mischief.. your primitive lack of judgment.. hmm.CHENIER: I do know.

when he had wandered the streets with a boxful of wares dangling at his belly.. Baldini closed his eyes and watched as the most sublime memories were awakened within him. It did not interest him. positioning himself exactly as his master had stood before. syrups. her large sparkling green eyes. It was floral. They threw it out the window into the river. the real sea. The child seemed to be smelling right through his skin. just short of her seventieth birthday. almost worse than the basic identification of the parts. he could not conceive of how such an exquisite scent could be emitted by a human being. openly admitting that she would definitely have let the thing perish. defeated. Baldini ranted on. valise in hand. even when it was a matter of life and death. this scruffy brat who was worth more than his weight in gold. hardworking organ that has been trained to smell for many decades. He had hold of it tight.