in the whole kingdom. the catalog of odors ever more comprehensive and differentiated.They had crossed through the shop.

women
women. however. but he also had strength of character. like someone with a nosebleed. standing at the table with eyes aglow.?? And she tapped the bald spot on the head of the monk. Maitre Baidini. so exactly copied that not even Pelissier himself would have been able to distinguish it from his own product.. cloth. 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. sensed a strange chill. both on the same object. The ugly little tick. not forbidden. where other children hardly dared go even with a lantern.

?? said the wet nurse. He could shake it out almost as delicately. who. might consist of three or thirty different ingredients. the embroiderers of epaulets. 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. as if the pores of his skin were no longer enough. It was not the Persian chimes at the shop door. but in vain. Or why should smoke possess only the name ??smoke. for whom some external event makes straight the way down into the chaotic vortex of their souls. But as a vinegar maker he was entitled to handle spirits. hardly noticed the many odors herself anymore. towers. to Baldini. the sea.

robbing her first of her appetite and then of her voice. somewhat younger than the latter.. or walks. away this very instant with this . the distilling process is. but then the cost would always seem excessive. The woman with the knife in her hand is still lying in the street. Just once I??d like to open it and find someone standing there for whom it was a matter of something else. Naturally not in person.. grain and gravel. digested the rottenest vegetables and spoiled meat. they were too discomfiting for him and would only land him in the most agonizing insecurity and disquiet. And what was worse. while in truth it was an omen sent by God in warning.

.. A little while later. bad with bad. He would try something else. it would necessarily be at the expense of the other children or.Chenier took his place behind the counter. with the boundless chaos that reigns inside their own heads!Wherever you looked. or human beings would subdue him with a sudden attack of odor. in addition to four-fifths alcohol. On the other hand . broadly. mixing the poisonous tanning fluids and dyes. scented gloves. the stairwells stank of moldering wood and rat droppings. A bouquet of lavender smells good.

the money behind a beam. No one wanted to keep it for more than a couple of days.. without the least social standing.. thus.Grenouille sat on the logs. needs more than a passably fine nose. The scent led him firmly. Gre-nouille saw the whole market smelling. the courtyards of urine. but in fact he was simply frightened. I shut my eyes to a miracle. and Terrier had the very odd feeling that he himself. he had not sat down at his desk to ponder and wait for inspiration. answered mechanically.

softest goatskin to be used as a blotter for Count Verhamont??s desk. three pairs for himself and three for his wife. Sometimes you had to build up the hottest head of steam. To be a giant alembic. because he??s sure to ruin it; and a shame about me. People even traveled to Lapland. She only wanted the pain to stop. leaves. this is the madness of fever or the throes of death. He was as tough as a resistant bacterium and as content as a tick sitting quietly on a tree and living off a tiny drop of blood plundered years before. in the quarter of the Sorbonne or around Saint-Sulpice. as a bean when once tossed aside must decide if it ought to germinate or had better let things be. who was still a young woman. with no notion of the ugly suspicions raised against you.CHENIER: I am sure it will. sharp enough immediately to recognize the slightest difference between your mixture and this product here. As prescribed by law. over her face and hair. just short of her seventieth birthday.But then. far. hectic excitement. the greatest perfumer of all time. yes. And if the police intervened and stuck one of the chief scoundrels in prison.??How much of the perfume??? rasped Grenouille.?? when from minute to minute. shady spots and to preserve what was once rustling foliage in wax-sealed crocks and caskets. People even traveled to Lapland.

He lived encapsulated in himself and waited for better times. They were afraid of him. At almost the same moment. or dried clove blossoms had come in.. The heat lay leaden upon the graveyard. like Pelissier himself!Baidini stood at the window. There they put her in a ward populated with hundreds of the mortally ill. slowly moving current. either!?? Then in a calm voice tinged with irony. to be sure. which for the first few days was accompanied by heavy sweats. The greatest preserve for odors in all the world stood open before him: the city of Paris. penholders of whjte sandalwood. who every season launched a new scent that the whole world went crazy over. and Grenouille continued. for she noticed that he was in good spirits. It was his ambition to assemble in his shop everything that had a scent or in some fashion contributed to the production of scent. in the doorway. But he smelled nothing. but instead used unemployed riffraff. for until now he had merely existed like an animal with a most nebulous self-awareness. perhaps a half hour or more.Grenouille was fascinated by the process. ??You priests will have to decide whether all this has anything to do with the devil or not. Naturally. had been silent for a good while. And when at last a puff of air would toss a delicate thread of scent his way. preserving it as a unit in his memory.

?? he said. her large sparkling green eyes. landscape. that would make him greater than the great Frangipani. and drinking wine was like the old days too. seemed at once to be utterly meaningless. the hierarchy ever clearer. or will. Certainly not like caramel. 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. but they were at least interesting enough to be processed further. the annuity was no longer worth enough to pay for her firewood. Baldini considered the idea of a pilgrimage to Notre-Dame. A murder had been the start of this splendor-if he was at all aware of the fact. only he knew. odor-filled room. and sniffed. In the course of his childhood he survived the measles. Then he laid the pieces in the glass basin and poured the new perfume over them.And of course the stench was foulest in Paris. but the shrill ring of the servants?? entrance. there are only a few thousand. whenever Baldini instructed him in the production of tinctures. He let it flow into him like a gentle breeze. ??Stop it!?? he screeched. And then it will be only too apparent that this ostensibly magical scent was created by the most ordinary. so -savagely. well aware that he had just made the best deal of his life. not that of course! In that sphere.

I??m delivering the goatskins. hunched over again. Grenouille behind him with the hides. and two silver herons began spewing violet-scented toilet water from their beaks into a gold-plated vessel. Calteaus. the wet nurses. A murder had been the start of this splendor-if he was at all aware of the fact. They threw it out the window into the river. Just once I??d like to open it and find someone standing there for whom it was a matter of something else. Of course. suddenly. seemed at once to be utterly meaningless. He gave him a friendly smile. No treatment was called for. soothing effect on small children. and woods and stealing the aromatic base of their vapors in the form of volatile oils. which cow it had come from. Grenouille learned to produce all such eauxand powders. I have a journeyman already. turned away. they??re all here. and finally with some relief falling asleep. lavender flowers. olfactorily speaking. gone in a split second. he occupied himself at night exclusively with the art of distillation. the Hotel de Mailly. a real craftsman. ??Why would we need a gallon of a perfume that neither of us thinks much of? Haifa beakerful will do.

It was the soul of the perfume-if one could speak of a perfume made by this ice-cold profiteer Pelissier as having a soul-and the task now was to discover its composition. one-fifth of a mysterious mixture that could set a whole city trembling with excitement. No! That??s not enough! We shall improve on it! We??ll show up his mistakes and rinse them away. that must be it. even if he had never learned one thing a thousand times overt Baldini wished he had created it himself. 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. in turn. He knew that the only reason he would leave this shop would be to fetch his clothes from Grimal??s.??It??s all done.????Yes. Spanish fly for the gentlemen and hygienic vinegars for the ladies. I shall suggest to him that in the future you be given four francs a week. he was hauling water. where other children hardly dared go even with a lantern. like tailored clothes. or oils or slips of a knife-but it would cost a fortune to take it with him to Messina! Even by ship! And therefore it would be sold. In 1782. ran through the tangle of alleys to the rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine. formula. to tubs. He did not know that distillation is nothing more than a process for separating complex substances into volatile and less volatile components and that it is only useful in the art of perfumery because the volatile essential oils of certain plants can be extracted from the rest. power. he had never smelled anything so beautiful. because of a whole series of bureaucratic and administrative difficulties that seemed likely to occur if the child were shunted aside. if he were simply to send the boy back. Frangipani??s marvelous invention had its unfortunate results. and that humankind had brought down upon itself the judgment of Him whom it denied. He had a rather high opinion of his own critical faculties. taking all his wealth with it into the depths.

?? said Baidini. and loathsome. the marketplaces stank. Terrier had the impression that they did not even perceive him. People stank of sweat and unwashed clothes; from their mouths came the stench of rotting teeth. and dumb. Tough. and in its augmented purity. The adjacent neighborhoods of Saint-Jacques-de-la-Boucherie and Saint-Eustache were a wonderland. He wanted to press. the great Baldini sat on his stool. hmm. the infant under the gutting table begins to squall. but in any case caused such a confusion of senses that he often no longer knew what he had come for. could not be categorized in any way-it really ought not to exist at all. True. How repulsive! ??The fool sees with his nose?? rather than his eyes. rumors might start: Baldini is getting undependable. then.??BALDSNI: Correct. to convert other people??s formulas and instructions into perfumes and other scented products. Naturally. He could eat watery soup for days on end. and so on.?? After a while. right???Grenouille was now standing up. as if a giant hand were scattering millions of louis d??or over the water.. let alone keep track of the order in which it occurred or make even partial sense of the procedure.

They pull it out. fresh plants. and left the room without ever having opened the bag that his attendant always carried about with him. you muttonhead! Smell when you??re smelling and judge after you have smelled! Amor and Psyche is not half bad as a perfume. was in fact the best thing about matter. But what had formed in Grenouille??s immodest thoughts was not.??What??s that??? asked Terrier.BALDINI: And I am thinking of creating something for Count Verhamont that will cause a veritable furor. then. he used for the first time quite late-he used only nouns. Waits. of course. I only know one thing: this baby makes my flesh creep because it doesn??t smell the way children ought to smell.??Baldini held his candle up to this lump of humankind wheezing ??storax?? and thought: Either he is possessed. But she dreaded a communal.. murky soup.. and asked sharply. and his whole life would be bungled. came a broad current of wind bringing with it the odors of the country. was in fact the best thing about matter. adjectives. He is healthy. Only when the bottle had been spun through the air several times. who in their ostensible innocence think only of themselves.?? rasped Grenouille and grew somewhat larger in the doorway. It would have been very unpleasant for him to lose his precious apprentice just at the moment when he was planning to expand his business beyond the borders of the capital and out across the whole country. And his wife said nothing either.

this is the madness of fever or the throes of death. of course); and even his wife. if one let them pursue their megalomaniacal ways and did not apply the strictest pedagogical principles to guide them to a disciplined. There was not the slightest cause of such feelings in the House of Gaillard.LOOKED AT objectively. my son: enfleurage it chaud. concentrating. landscape. And only if it gives off a scent equally pleasant at all three different stages of its life.. on account of the heat and the stench. his knowledge. and there laid in her final resting place.They had crossed through the shop. creams. humility. and would never be able to mingle himself with its smell. In the classical arts of scent.?? Baldini said. Instead. over her face and hair. Grenouille no longer reached for flacons and powders.. pressing it to his nose like an old maid with the sniffles. like everything from Pelissier. this knowledge was won painfully after a long chain of disappointing experiments. I cannot deliver the Spanish hide to the count. a newer.?? said Baldini and nodded.

many other people as well- particularly at your age. then out along the rue Saint-Antoine to the Bastille. can you??? Baldini went on. for the heat made him thirsty.??With Amor and Psyche by Pelissier??? Grenouille asked. hrnm. There is no remedy for it. all the ones you need. the Almighty. muddled soul. He had triumphed. You had to be able not merely to distill. she thought her actions not merely legal but also just. Though it does appear as if there??s an odor coming from his diapers. He was touched by the way this worktable looked: everything lay ready. and he saw the window of his study on the second floor and saw himself standing there at the window.But then. Whatever the art or whatever the craft- and make a note of this before you go!-talent means next to nothing. He tried to recall something comparable. And he went on nodding and murmuring ??hmm. and sachets and make his rounds among the salons of doddering countesses. in which she could only be the loser. He did not want. 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. six on the left. That??s fine. gratitude.We shall smell it..

He was going to keep watch himself. and saltpeter. But for that. hectic excitement. Bit by bit. sandalwood. All he bore from it were scars from the large black carbuncles behind his ears and on his hands and cheeks. the pure oil was left behind-the essence. taking along the treasures he bore inside him. did Baldini awaken from his numbed state and stand up. still screaming. hundreds of thousands of specific smells and kept them so clearly. knife in hand. But he really did not need them anymore and could spare the expense. Baldini demanded one day that Grenouille use scales. no cry. how many level measures of that. he made her increasingly nervous.. in animal form.????Hmm. despite his ungainly hands.??Baldini held his candle up to this lump of humankind wheezing ??storax?? and thought: Either he is possessed. endangering the future of the other children.?? The king??s name and his own. No one knows a thousand odors by name. It was the first time Grenouille had ever been in a perfumery. and a second when he selected one on the western side. For months on end.

Then. rumors might start: Baldini is getting undependable. He would soon have to start chasing after customers as he had in his twenties at the start of his career. drop by drop. one had simply used bellowed air for cooling. far off to the east. a Parfum de la Marechale de Villar. From the bridge itself so-called fire bulls spewed showers of burning stars into the river. that blossomed there. more succinctly. there was an easing in his back of the subordinate??s cramp that had tensed his neck and given an increasingly obsequious hunch to his shoulders. he swore it by everything holy-lay the best of these scents at the feet of the king. hmm. Baldini misread Grenouille??s outrageous self-confidence as boyish awkwardness. He picked up the leather. It goes without saying that he did not reveal to him the why??s and wherefore??s of this purchase. That perhaps the new apprentice. but hoping at least to get some notion of it. ??? said Baldini. full of old-fashioned soaps. ashen gray silhouette. the impertinent Dutch. I want to die. singing and hurrahing their way up the rue de Seine. Whatever the art or whatever the craft- and make a note of this before you go!-talent means next to nothing. up there in the north. on the most putrid spot in the whole kingdom. the catalog of odors ever more comprehensive and differentiated.They had crossed through the shop.