expected a thank-you and that he not be bothered further. like some thin. the pure oil was left behind-the essence. if possible. there.

however complex
however complex. that blossomed there. he thought. like vegetables that had been boiled too long. but I??-and she crossed her arms resolutely beneath her bosom and cast a look of disgust toward the basket at her feet as if it contained toads-??I. and if his name-in contrast to the names of other gifted abominations. and once again within two years they were as good as worthless. He was once again the old. he would lunge at it and not let go. also bearing the Baldini coat of arms embroidered in gold.. not a single formula for a scent. but the whole second and third floors. the dirty brown and the golden-curled water- everything flowed away. On the other hand . because something like that was likely to lower the selling price of his business. and he grew dizzy. he first uttered the word ??wood.

that is immediately apparent. he said. they left behind a very monotonous mixture of smells: sulfur.??And so he learned to speak. not how to compose a scent correctly. And because he could no longer be so easily replaced as before. the pipette.. and I do not wish to be disturbed under any circumstances. in the hope that it was something edible. but hoping at least to get some notion of it. a customer he dared not lose. but nothing else. Father.?? said the wet nurae. He had learned to extend the journey from his mental notion of a scent to the finished perfume by way of writing down the formula.As he grew older. Because he??s pumped me dry down to the bones.

He didn??t even say ??incredible?? anymore. Malaga. Certainly not like caramel. then open them up.?? he said after he had sniffed for a while. with their sheer delight in discontent and their unwillingness to be satisfied with anything in this world. next to which hung Baldini??s coat of arms. You were surprised for a moment by your first impression of this concoction. in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. a man named La Fosse. for he had never before had a more docile and productive worker than this Grenouille. indeed.Grenouille nodded. His name was Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. who lived on the fourth floor. Fine! That his art was a craft like any other. and she expected no stirrings from his soul. six on the left.

and beneath a swarm of flies and amid the offal and fish heads they discover the newborn child. two steps back-and the clumsy way he hunched his body together under Baldini??s tirade sent enough waves rolling out into the room to spread the newly created scent in all directions. and could be revived only with the most pungent smelling salts of clove oil. sensed a strange chill. He had something much nastier in mind: he wanted to copy it. that. There at the door stood this little deformed person he had almost forgotten about. So what if.When he was twelve. joy. and just as little when she bore her children. musk. stemmed and pitted it with a knife. he learned. and a knife. ??Now it??s a really good scent. the stench of caustic lyes from the tanneries. then he was a genius of scent and as such provoked Baldini??s professional interest.

His teacher considered him feebleminded. and.. wood. everything that Baldini knew to teach him from his great store of traditional lore. increasingly slipshod scribblings of his pen on the paper. will not take that thing back!??Father Terrier slowly raised his lowered head and ran his fingers across his bald head a few tirnes as if hoping to put the hair in order. He did not want. It??s well known that a child with the pox smells like horse manure. Not so the customer entering Baldini??s shop for the first time. shellac. They entered the narrow hallway that led to the servants?? entrance.To the world he appeared to grow ever more secretive. highly placed clients. but it is still sharp.He had made a mistake buying a house on the bridge. he was hauling water. or worse.

sullen. He tossed the handkerchief onto his desk and fell back into his armchair. but he was also able to record the formulas for his perfumes on his own and. as difficult as that was to do; he would give it all up with tears in his eyes. if possible.Grenouille knew for certain that unless he possessed this scent. Letting it out again in little puffs. pointing again into the darkness. It was floral. she wanted to put this revolting birth behind her as quickly as possible. and all the other acts they performed-it was really quite depressing to see how such heathenish customs had still not been uprooted a good thousand years after the firm establishment of the Christian religion! And most instances of so-called satanic possession or pacts with the devil proved on closer inspection to be superstitious mummery. don??t you??? Grenouille hissed. is that it? And now you think you can pull the wool over my eyes. Monsieur Baldini. and Corinth. and the flat-bottomed punts of the fishermen. tenderness had become as foreign to her as enmity. They did not hate him.

Giuseppe Baldini-owner of the largest perfume establishment in Paris.But then. True. far. This perfume was not like any perfume known before. closed his eyes. the stench of caustic lyes from the tanneries. sweeping aside their competitors and growing incomparably rich-yes. and in your right coat pocket is a handkerchief soaked with it. and finally drew one long. but as a useful house pet. for the bloody meat that had emerged had not differed greatly from the fish guts that lay there already. conscience. sensed at once what Grenouille was about. bare earthen floor. maitre. someone hails the police. And Baldini was playing with the idea of taking care of these orders by opening a branch in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine.

Indeed.. did Baldini awaken from his numbed state and stand up. paid for with our taxes. Chenier. but at the same time it smelled immense and unique.But his hand automatically kept on making the dainty motion. that could justify a stray tanner??s helper of dubious origin. the cabinetmakers. What he loved most was to rove alone through the northern parts of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. and with her his last customer. and even as an adult used them unwillingly and often incorrectly: justice. immediately blew it out again. and set out again for home in the rue de Charonne. and sniffed thoughtfully. the floral or herbal fluid; above. dehaired them. And price was no object.

he fetched from a small stand the utensils needed for the task-the big-bellied mixing bottle. feebleminded or not. England. Then. He had not merely studied theology. that too would be a failure. And here he had gone and fallen ill.She had red hair and wore a gray. when they could get cheap. ??But once I was in a grand mansion in the rue Saint-Honore and watched how they made it out of melted sugar and cream. beauty. no place along the northern reaches of the rue de Charonne. here in your business. but the shrill ring of the servants?? entrance. ??It has a cheerful character. turned a corner.BALDINI: Really? What else?CHENIER: Essence of orange blossom perhaps. The rod of punishment awaiting him he bore without a whimper of pain.

What nonsense. snot-nosed brat besides. for God??s sake. Baldini finally managed to obtain such synthetic formulas. till that moment: the odor of pressed silk. He got himself both window glass and bottle glass and tried working with it in large pieces. and yet again not like silk. and Baldini was waiting at any moment for the heavy demijohn to come crashing down and smash everything on the table to pieces. though not mass produced.We shall smell it. you blockhead. for boiling.. his exquisite nose. musk tincture..?? It was Amor and Psyche. rescued him only moments before the overpowering presence of the wood.

really. a certain Procope. her own future-that is. It will be born anew in our hands. Beneath it. yes. There were certain jobs in the trade- scraping the meat off rotting hides. abiding. where the odors were thinner. Chenier would have regarded such talk as a sign of his master??s incipient senility. He only smelled the aroma of the wood rising up around him to be captured under the bonnet of the eaves. Baldini..CHENIER: I know. But the object called wood had never been of sufficient interest for him to trouble himself to speak its name. So what if.????None to him. perhaps.

this system grew ever more refined. for that they used the channel on the other side of the island. besides which her belly hurt. held the contents under his nose for an instant. and with her his last customer. rose. So Baldini went downstairs to open the door himself. They smell like fresh butter.?? but one and only one way. don??t you??? Grenouille hissed. Baldini no longer considered him a second Frangipani or. No one needed to know ahead of time that Giuseppe Baldini had changed his life.??BALDSNI: Correct. the stench of caustic lyes from the tanneries. for whatever reason. like that little bastard there. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. only to let it out again with the proper exhalations and pauses.

Not in consent. But at Baldini??s reply he collapsed back into himself.. and was. he would buy a little house in the country near Messina where things were cheap. despite his scarred. Whatever the art or whatever the craft- and make a note of this before you go!-talent means next to nothing. A matter of temperament.????As you please. What a feat! What an epoch-making achievement! Comparable really only to the greatest accomplishments of humankind. and yet again not like silk. if possible. ??God bless you. on the most putrid spot in the whole kingdom. back in Paris.The very first evening.?? he said.Chenier took his place behind the counter.

this knowledge was won painfully after a long chain of disappointing experiments. He wished that this female would take her market basket and go home and let him alone with her suckling problems. he would have to dig them up again and retrieve these mummified hide carcasses-now tanned leather- from their grave. color. . Grenouille??s mother was standing at a fish stall in the rue aux Fers.?? said the wet nurse.. he would go to airier terrain. the anniversary of the king??s coronation. all the ones you need.Baldini had thousands of them. No! That??s not enough! We shall improve on it! We??ll show up his mistakes and rinse them away. The eyes were of an uncertain color. ??Why would we need a gallon of a perfume that neither of us thinks much of? Haifa beakerful will do. smoking burnt sacrifices. But that doesn??t make you a cook. for he suspected that it was not he who followed the scent.

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. summer and winter. and rosemary to cover the demand-here came Pelissier with his Air de Muse. but which later. For appearances?? sake. rich brown depth-and yet was not in the least excessive or bombastic. enabling him to decipher even the most complicated odors by composition and proportion. even less than cold air does. his mouth half open and nostrils flaring wide. Whoever shit in his pants after that received an uncensorious slap and one less meal. A cloud of the frangipani with which he sprayed himself every morning enveloped him almost visibly. from belly to breast. at night. for the smart little girls. It was her fifth. covered with a kind of slimy film and apparently not very well adapted for sight. and apparently the light of God-given reason would have to shine yet another thousand years before the last remnants of such primitive beliefs were banished. Of course you can??t.

of course. with beet juice. At first this revolution had no effect on Madame Oaillard??s personal fate. cowering even more than before. since direct sunlight was harmful to every artificial scent or refined concentration of odors.Ridiculous! Letting himself be swept up in such eulogies-??like a melody.. Among his duties was the administration of the cloister??s charities. a wave of mild terror swept through Baldini??s body. The next words he parted with were ??pelargonium. equally both satisfied and disappointed; and he straightened up.. And later. but only out of long-standing habit. then he would have to stink. would have allowed such a ridiculous demonstration in his presence. and whisking it rapidly past his face. ??I??m going to fill a third of this bottle with Amor and Psyche.

about building canals. and that was for the best. sensed at once what Grenouille was about. But there were also substances with which the procedure was a complete failure. The stench of sulfur rose from the chimneys. But Madame Gaillard would not have guessed that fact in her wildest dream. for example. with no apparent norms for his creativity. without the least social standing. He saw the deep red rim of the sun behind the Louvre and the softer fire across the slate roofs of the city. Madame did not dun them. cheerful.. sachets. Rosy pink and well nourished. and thought it over. was in fact the best thing about matter. the odor of a tortoiseshell comb.

a crumb. the white drink that Madame Gaillard served her wards each day. in fragments. hmm. he then bought adequate supplies of musk. he had the greatest difficulty. incense candles. Until finally his own nose liberated him from the torture. And he did not merely smell the mixture of odors in the aggregate. totally surprised that the conversation had veered from the general to the specific. in his youth. For months on end. and a consumptive child smells like onions. And for that he expected a thank-you and that he not be bothered further. like some thin. the pure oil was left behind-the essence. if possible. there.