had never invented anything. nor did they begrudge him the food he ate. And that??s how little children have to smell-and no other way.

like this skunk Pelissier
like this skunk Pelissier. He despised technical details. Chenier was still shaking with awe fifteen minutes later. pockmarked face and his bulbous old-man??s nose. He could eat watery soup for days on end. Baidini had shut himself up in his laboratory with his new apprentice. I am feeling generous this evening. cucumbers.He could hardly smell anything now. That sort of thing would not have been even remotely possible before! That a reputable craftsman and established commerfant should have to struggle to exist-that had begun to happen only in the last few decades! And only since this hectic mania for novelty had broken out in every quarter. but in fact he was simply frightened. and craftsman.That night. God gives good times and bad times. plants.The scent was so heavenly fine that tears welled into Baldini??s eyes. applied labels to them. he fetched from a small stand the utensils needed for the task-the big-bellied mixing bottle. Only later-on the eve of the Revolution. The last item he lugged over was a demijohn full of high-proof rectified spirit. He had something much nastier in mind: he wanted to copy it.

of course. But for the present. offering humankind vexation and misery along with their benefits. 1753. And once again she received in return only these stupid slips of paper. with their own weapons.. and so on. Above all. Monsieur Baldini?????No.??And so he learned to speak.. They probably realized that he could not be destroyed. hmm. randomly.And so Baldini decided to leave no stone unturned to save the precious life of his apprentice. ??Pay attention! I . Perhaps the closest analogy to his talent is the musical wunderkind. fifteen. ??It??s been put together very bad. swung the heavy door open-and saw nothing.

misanthropy. he even knew how by sheer imagination to arrange new combinations of them. And later. if he lifted his gaze the least bit.?? Baldini continued. There is no remedy for it. But except for a few ridiculous plant oils. this system grew ever more refined. and there he handed over the child. it could have grabbed the other possibility open to it and held its peace and thus have chosen the path from birth to death without a detour by way of life. and sniffed thoughtfully. which connected the right bank with the He de la Cite.BALDINI: I alone give birth to them. He was dead tired. using the appropriate calculations for the quantity one desired.?? when from minute to minute.?? said Terrier and took his finger from his nose. grasping the back of his armchair with both hands. I??m delivering the goatskins. This often went on all night long. hair tonics.

to hope that he would get so much as a toehold in the most renowned perfume shop in Paris-all the less so.. Paris produced over ten thousand new foundlings. but simply because the boy had said the name of the wretched perfume that had defeated his efforts at decoding today. ??You maintain. And yet. but carefully nourished flame. and craftsman.. where the odors were thinner. He did not want to spill a drop of her scent. all quickly plucked down and set at the ready on the edge of the table. he stepped up to the old oak table to make his test. it??s charming.Or he would go to the spot where they had beheaded his mother. You had to be fluent in Latin.Here.?? said the wet nurse. Six of them resided on the right bank. paid for with our taxes. and the stream of scent became a flood that inundated him with its fragrance.

there reigned in the cities a stench barely conceivable to us modern men and women. after all. and loathsome. and flared his nostrils. Standing there at his ease and letting the rest of Baldini??s oration flow by. The darkness completely swallowed the light of his candle. and he didn??t want the infant to be harmed in the process. however complex. it??s charming. from their bellies that of onions. Utmost caution with the civet! One drop too much brings catastrophe. like fresh butter. He stepped aside to let the lad out. It looked as flabby and pale as soggy straw. porcelain. then with dismay. still screaming. Now you can feed him yourselves with goat??s milk. sullen. looking ridiculous with handkerchief in hand. She needed the money.

so it was said. when I lie dying in Messina someday. He recognized at once the source of the scent that he had followed from half a mile away on the other bank of the river: not this squalid courtyard. nor from whom he could salvage anything else for himself. under the spell of the rotund flacon-both spellbound. women smelled of rancid fat and rotting fish. For instance. a magical. weighing ingredients. I??m not in the mood to test it at the moment. but not frenetic. but it soon became apparent that fireworks had nothing to offer in the way of odors.????Because he??s stuffed himself on me. best nose in Paris!??But Grenouille was silent. and such-in short. accompanied by wine and the screech of cicadas. And later. lavender flowers. Baldini was worried. swelling in allergic reaction till it was stopped up as tight as if plugged with wax. syrups.

like tailored clothes. there.THERE WERE a baker??s dozen of perfumers in Paris in those days. and thus first made available for higher ends. ??Just a rough one. ??There are three other ways.Grenouille did it. tall and spindly and fragile. Go now! Come on!??And he picked up one of the candlesticks and passed through the door into the shop.. for gusts were serrating the surface. The scent was so exceptionally delicate and fine that he could not hold on to it; it continually eluded his perception. hectic excitement. Then he stood up and blew out the candle. It squinted up its eyes. Naturally. 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.CHENIER: I am sure it will.LOOKED AT objectively. He could not smell a thing now. tipping the contents of flacons a second time in apparently random order and quantity into the funnel.

Everything that Baldini produced was a success. to club him to death.??He was reaching for the candlestick on the table. It was as if he had been born a second time; no. Baldini. Just once I??d like to open it and find someone standing there for whom it was a matter of something else. 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. this system grew ever more refined. By mixing his aromatic powder with alcohol and so transferring its odor to a volatile liquid. But no! He was dying now. the oracles.. his notepaper on his knees. broadly. and walks off to wash. Such things come only with age. These distillates were only barely similar to the odor of their ingredients. his phenomenal memory.??And there you have it! That is a clear sign. It goes without saying that he did not reveal to him the why??s and wherefore??s of this purchase. for tanning requires vast quantities of water.

perfumer. young man. but. And for all that. and the air at ground level formed damp canals where odors congealed. he managed on the thinnest milk.??What is she doing with that knife???Nothing. good God!-then you needn??t wonder that everything was turned upside down. Baldini opened the back room that faced the river and served partly as a storeroom. Father. In the course of his childhood he survived the measles. even if that blow with the poker had left her olfactory organ intact.. to doubt his power-Terrier could not go so far as that; ecclesiastical bodies other than one small. he had done all he could to make sure that he would be the one to deliver it. or. He could not smell a thing now. highly placed clients. and essences. once the greatest perfumer of Paris. more like curds .

gathering his forces. with no apparent norms for his creativity. over and over. That perhaps the new apprentice. that blossomed there. far off to the east. he opened the flacon with a gentle turn of the stopper. spewing viscous pus and blood streaked with yellow. the wet nurse Jeanne Bussie stood. unfolded it and sprinkled it with a few drops that he extracted from the mixing bottle with the long pipette. lavender flowers. and animal secretions within tinctures and fill them into bottles. do you? Now if you have passably good ears. the handkerchief still pressed to his nose.And with that he closed his eyes. had even put the black plague behind him. and they are used for extraction of the finest of all scents: jasmine. But then. endangering the future of the other children. For certain reasons. He couldn??t go to Pelissier and buy perfume in person! But through a go-between.

packed by smart little girls. for he had only one concern-not to lose the least trace of her scent. and enfleurage a I??huile. he heard I-love-you and felt his hair ruffle with bliss. grabbed the neck of the bottle with his right hand. ??God bless you. he loved the crackling of the burning wood. He caught the scent of morning. porcelain. it??s a merchant. And if they don??t smell like that. In his fastidious. which in turn was shaped like the flacon in the Baldini coat of arms. and could be revived only with the most pungent smelling salts of clove oil. of their livelihood. At almost the same moment. pressing it to his nose like an old maid with the sniffles. and so there was no human activity. 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. Not in consent. like a griddle cake that??s been soaked in milk.

To be sure. resins. It was floral. but he would do it nonetheless. and he filtered them out from the aromatic mixture and kept them unnamed in his memory: ambergris. This perfume was not like any perfume known before. and two silver herons began spewing violet-scented toilet water from their beaks into a gold-plated vessel. true-but it was more honorable and pleasing to God than to perish in splendor in Paris. ambrosial with ambrosial. see where I mean. The first was the cloak of middle-class respectability. an atom of scent; no. hmm. noticed that he had certain abilities and qualities that were highly unusual.. as well as almost every room facing the river on the ground floor. that you could not see the sky. Pelissier! An old stinker is what you are! An upstart in the craft of perfumery. that??s it exactly.BALDINI: I alone give birth to them. for back then just for the production of a simple pomade you needed abilities of which this vinegar mixer could not even dream.

acquired in humility and with hard work. all the rest aren??t odors. however.BALDINI: It??s of no consequence at all to me in any case. and had produced a son with her and he was rocking him here now on his own knees. he drowned in it. by the way. She diapered the little ones three times a day. a barbaric bungler. from where he went right on with his unconscionable pamphleteering. Your grandiose failure will also be an opportunity for you to learn the virtue of humility. I don??t know if it will be how a craftsman would do it. laid the leather on the table. . sparing itself and the world a great deal of mischief. But there were no aesthetic principles governing the olfactory kitchen of his imagination. or musk has. Grenouille??s mother was standing at a fish stall in the rue aux Fers. feces. then in a threadlike stream. pestle and spatula.

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. ??They??re fine. and whenever the memory of it rose up too powerfully within him he would mutter imploringly.BALDINI: Yes. and it vanished at once. And as he walked behind Baldini. Baldini resumed the same position as before and stared out of the window. But then.????Yes. so much so that Grenouille hesitated to dissect the odors into fishy. smelled it all as if for the first time. hardly noticeable something. in the rush of nausea he would have hurled it like a spider from him. this Amor and Psyche. but as a useful house pet.?? rasped Grenouille and grew somewhat larger in the doorway. The darkness completely swallowed the light of his candle. benzoin. for the old man to get out of the way and make room for him. he had totally dispensed with them just to go on living-from the very start. and thus first made available for higher ends.

never once making an attempt to resist. Odors have a power of persuasion stronger than that of words.??Yes indeed. still screaming.Naturally there was not room for all these wares in the splendid but small shop that opened onto the street (or onto the bridge). a fine nose. the wet nurse Jeanne Bussie stood. blocking the way for Baldini. it??s charming. Yes. I am feeling generous this evening.?? when from minute to minute. Baldini considered the idea of a pilgrimage to Notre-Dame. the kind one feels when suddenly overcome with some long discarded fear. he??ll burn my house down. Years later. It might smell like hair. He preferred to leave the smell of the sea blended together. he used for the first time quite late-he used only nouns. The odor of frangipani had long since ceased to interfere with his ability to smell; he had carried it about with him for decades now and no longer noticed it at all. There was just such a fanatical child trapped inside this young man.

and left his study. the Hotel de Mailly. full of old-fashioned soaps.. it was the word ??fishes. and by 1797 (she was nearing ninety now) she had lost her entire fortune. though not mass produced. there. then the alchemist in Baldini would stir. ??You??re supposed to smell like caramel. But on the other hand. there where you??ve got nothing left. flooding the whole world with a distillate of his own making. closer and closer. and the pain deadened all susceptibility to sensate impressions. But what had formed in Grenouille??s immodest thoughts was not. He backed up against the wall.?? said the wet nurse. rotting. but only until their second birthday. even women.

sometimes you just left it at a moderate boil. But there were no aesthetic principles governing the olfactory kitchen of his imagination. merchant. did not see her delicate. the vinegar man. Now it was this boy with his inexhaustible store of new scents. the number of perfumes had been modest.BALDSNI: Naturally not. He pulled a fresh snowy white lace handkerchief from his coat pocket. moreover. they gave up their attempted murders. with beet juice. and that was why Chenier must know nothing about it. tossed onto a tumbrel at four in the morning with fifty other corpses. the two truly great perfumes to which he owed his fortune. He had found the compass for his future life. with the boundless chaos that reigns inside their own heads!Wherever you looked. But death did not come. It might smell like hair. for it was like the old days. An absolute classic-full and harmonious.

Having observed what a sure hand Grenouille had with the apparatus. ??by God- incredible. slid down off the logs. as long as the world would exist. for dyeing. variety.?? he said. however. the wounds to close. especially those of an ethical or moral nature. plus teas and herbal blends. and beneath a swarm of flies and amid the offal and fish heads they discover the newborn child. and had produced a son with her and he was rocking him here now on his own knees. was growing and growing. he simply had too much to do. he thought. the heavily scented principle of the plant. he. had obediently bent his head down. any more than it speaks. had stood for nights on end at their shop windows.

a mass grave beneath a thick layer of quicklime. Pelissier! An old stinker is what you are! An upstart in the craft of perfumery. He already had some. and at the same time it had warmth. benzoin. as if the pores of his skin were no longer enough. creating a precisely measured concentrate of the various essences.. ??Tell your master that the skins are fine. His teacher considered him feebleminded. And Pelissier??s grew daily. By then he would himself be doddering and would have to sell his business. and smelled. the House of Giuseppe Baidini began its ascent to national. He sensed he had been proved wrong. and marinated tuna. And for that he expected a thank-you and that he not be bothered further. If ever anything in his life had kindled his enthusiasm- granted. who had parsed a scent right off his forehead. A matter of temperament. I??ll be too old to take it over.

It was as if he were just playing. grasping the back of his armchair with both hands.??It was not spoken as a request. fully human existence. An absolute classic-full and harmonious. incense candles. full of old-fashioned soaps. The thought suddenly occurred to him-and he giggled as it did-that it made no difference now. ! And he was about to lunge for the demijohn and grab it out of the madman??s hands when Grenouille set it down himself. there are only a few thousand.. To the world she looked as old as her years-and at the same time two. without bumping against the bridge piers. He preferred to leave the smell of the sea blended together. But if he came close. There was no other way. that his business was prospering. and had it not so blatantly contradicted his understanding of a Christian??s love for his neighbor. He did not have to test it.Then the child awoke. for it was impossible to make a living nursing just one babe.

familiar methods. a certain Procope. every edifice of odors that he had so playfully created within himself. They piled rags and blankets and straw over his face and weighed it all down with bricks. The child seemed to be smelling right through his skin. besides which her belly hurt. it would doubtless have abruptly come to a grisly end. where he splashed lengthwise and face first into the water like a soft mattress. as He has many. the tables full of doth and dishes and shoe soles and all the hundreds of other things sold there during the day. for instance. and in its augmented purity. in his left the handkerchief. never in all his life seen jasmine in bloom. the basest of the senses! As if hell smelled of sulfur and paradise of incense and myrrh! The worst sort of superstition. was stripped of his holdings. But he at once felt the seriousness that reigned in these rooms. tended. He had never invented anything. nor did they begrudge him the food he ate. And that??s how little children have to smell-and no other way.