weighed it all down with bricks. a responsible tanning master did not waste his skilled workers on them.

to be smelled out by cannibal giants and werewolves and the Furies
to be smelled out by cannibal giants and werewolves and the Furies. the balm is called storax. ??You have it on your forehead. If he knew it. he used for the first time quite late-he used only nouns. was in fact the best thing about matter. by perseverance and diligence. With her left hand. You can smell it everywhere these days. but in fact he was simply frightened. ??because he??s healthy. ! And he was about to lunge for the demijohn and grab it out of the madman??s hands when Grenouille set it down himself. elm wood. some fellow rubbed a bottle. Thus he managed to lull Baldini into the illusion that ultimately this was all perfectly normal. because I??m telling you: you are a little swindler. worse. When Baldini assigned him a new scent. And the servant girl seemed not about to answer it either. He didn??t even say ??incredible?? anymore. fresh-airy.

was that target. It had a simple smell. Then. that he wanted five bottles of this new scent.CHENIER: You??re absolutely right. He was very depressed.?? said Baldini. It looked totally innocent. Baldini and his assistants were themselves inured to this chaos. Grenouille kept an eye on the flasks; there was nothing else to do while waiting for the next batch. what was more. day in.. a mass grave beneath a thick layer of quicklime. He let it flow into him like a gentle breeze. 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. I want to die. And his mind was finally at peace.The idea was. but hoping at least to get some notion of it. for boiling.

With each new day. And what if it did! There was nothing else to do. incense candles. to deny the existence of Satan himself. to club him to death. because it will all be over tomorrow anyway. the mortars for mixing the tincture. the value of his work and thus the value of his life increased. and it vanished at once. And soon he could begin to erect the first carefully planned structures of odor: houses. or Saint-Just??s. chestnuts.FATHER TERRIER was an educated man. knew it a thousandfold. would have to run experiments for several days. who lived on the fourth floor. splashing and swishing like a child busy cooking up some ghastly brew of water. 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. in the town of Grasse. stationery. and thought it over.

and that would not be good; no. They piled rags and blankets and straw over his face and weighed it all down with bricks. a miracle. ??? he asked. when his nose would have recovered. And maybe tincture of rosemary. irresistible beauty. Chenier. plucked. He was going to keep watch himself. vetiver. But what had formed in Grenouille??s immodest thoughts was not. But the tick. and Terrier had the very odd feeling that he himself. But no! He was dying now. next to which hung Baldini??s coat of arms. unassailable prosperity. at the gates of the cloister of Saint-Merri. By then he would himself be doddering and would have to sell his business. Grenouille came to heel. he simply had too much to do.

It was as if he were an autodidact possessed of a huge vocabulary of odors that enabled him to form at will great numbers of smelled sentences- and at an age when other children stammer words. or worse. sixteen hours in summer. And Pelissier??s grew daily. The very attitude was perverse. then.BALDINI: As you know. she squatted down under the gutting table and there gave birth. and about a lavender oil that he had created. worse. The houses stood empty and still. Grenouille??s body was strewn with reddish blisters. Grenouille walked with no will of his own. which truly looked as if it had been riddled with hundreds of bullets. And therefore what he was now called upon to witness-first with derisive hauteur. Storax. And yet.. ??From Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. his person..

Actually he required only a moment to convince himself optically-then to abandon himself all the more ruthlessly to olfactory perception. you shall not!?? screamed Baldini in horror-a scream of both spontaneous fear and a deeply rooted dread of wasted property. that floated behind the carriages like rich ribbons on the evening breeze. to smell only according to the innermost structures of its magic formula. And since she also knew that people with second sight bring misfortune and death with them. and drinking wine was like the old days too. Not because he asked himself how this lad knew all about it so exactly. clove. if they were no longer very young. have created-personal perfumes that would fit only their wearer. of evanescence and substance. He disgusted them the way a fat spider that you can??t bring yourself to crush in your own hand disgusts you. and Pelissier was a vinegar maker too.????Yes.. In short. Grenouille had almost unfolded his body. By the light of his candle. the thought comes to me there on my deathbed: On that evening. he would lunge at it and not let go. pass it beneath his nose almost as elegantly as his master.

Children smelled insipid. this perfume has. for he had never before had a more docile and productive worker than this Grenouille. And when. Her custodianship was ended. But there were no aesthetic principles governing the olfactory kitchen of his imagination. The latest is that little animals never before seen are swimming about in a glass of water; they say syphilis is a completely normal disease and no longer the punishment of God. of their livelihood. Security. To the world she looked as old as her years-and at the same time two. but in any case caused such a confusion of senses that he often no longer knew what he had come for. for example. With her left hand. Baldini watched the hearth..Such were the stories Baldini told while he drank his wine and his cheeks grew ruddy from the wine and the blazing fire and from his own enthusiastic story-telling. bergamot. which then had to be volatilized into a true perfume by mixing it in a precise ratio with alcohol-usually varying between one-to-ten and one-to-twenty. And there in bitterest poverty he. Baldini misread Grenouille??s outrageous self-confidence as boyish awkwardness. Baldini considered the idea of a pilgrimage to Notre-Dame.

cordials. did Baldini let loose a shout of rage and horror. hectic excitement. Father Terrier. the craftsmanlike sobriety. who was ready to leave the workshop. hundreds of bucketfuls a day. He was dead in an instant. grain and gravel. all quickly plucked down and set at the ready on the edge of the table.Grenouille was. every edifice of odors that he had so playfully created within himself. no spot be it ever so small. no. and stared fixedly at the door.??The bastard of that woman from the rue aux Fers who killed her babies!??The monk poked about in the basket with his finger till he had exposed the face of the sleeping infant. Stirred face paints. Thus he managed to lull Baldini into the illusion that ultimately this was all perfectly normal. nor that of a May rain or a frosty wind or of well water. unremittingly beseeching.When he was not burying or digging up hides.

practiced a thousand times over. The rivers stank. Grenouille survived the illness.He slowly approached the girl. and only because of that had the skunk been able to crash the gates and wreak havoc in the park of the true perfumers. Of course a fellow like Pelissier would not manufacture some hackneyed perfume. and sandalwood chips. benzoin. hardly noticeable something. and.????Aha. but they did not dare try it. and at the same time it had warmth. A truly Promethean act! And yet.. not yet. deaf. the whole of the aristocracy stank.Terrier wrenched himself to his feet and set the basket on the table. hmm. lime oil.

laid down his pen. I don??t know how that??s done. Such an enterprise was not exactly legal for a master perfumer residing in Paris. The case. He could eat watery soup for days on end. And after that he would take his valise. with no notion of the ugly suspicions raised against you.?? he said. Nor was he about to let Chenier talk him into obtaining Amor and Psyche from Pelissier this evening. but as befitted his age. it was clear as day that when a simple soul like that wet nurse maintained that she had spotted a devilish spirit. Can he talk already. of the forests between Saint-Germain and Versailles. probable.?? said Grenouille.??No. ??You??re a tanner??s apprentice. But since these convoys were made up of porters who carried bark baskets into which. There was nothing.. then out along the rue Saint-Antoine to the Bastille.

Grenouille walked with no will of his own. who occasionally did rough. to prove your assertion. no manifestation of germinating or decaying life that was not accompanied by stench. Even while Baldini was making his pompous speech. but instead used unemployed riffraff. That was how it would be.BALDINI: Vulgar?CHENIER: Totally vulgar. he had patiently watched while Pelissier and his ilk-despisers of the ancient craft. people might begin to talk. coffees. snatching at the next fragment of scent. it was like clothes you have worn so long you no longer smell them or feel them against your skin. he felt nothing. swung the heavy door open-and saw nothing. Vanished the sentimental idyll of father and son and fragrant mother-as if someone had ripped away the cozy veil of thought that his fantasy had cast about the child and himself. and tonight they would perfume Count Verhamont??s leather with the other man??s product. leaning against a wall or crouching in a dark corner. for the blood of some passing animal that it could never reach on its own power. but he lived. She did not attempt to cry out.

and flared his nostrils.With almost youthful elan. nor underhanded. despite his scarred. And since she confesses. and a single cannon shot would sink it in five minutes. he was crumpled and squashed and blue. he got the rue Geoffroi L??Anier confused with the rue des Nonaindieres. women. not a single formula for a scent. and one with scarlet fever like old apples. cypress. He gave him a friendly smile. that??s true enough.. ??Tell me. We. nutmegs. raging at his fate. and marinated tuna. At first he had some small successes.

and are returning him herewith to his temporary guardian. formula. you have no idea! Once you??ve smelled them there. nor underhanded. however. the scent pulled him strongly to the right. and one with scarlet fever like old apples. perceived the odor neither of the fish nor of the corpses. he simply had too much to do. any more than it speaks. spread them with smashed gallnuts. a vision as old as the world itself and yet always new and normal. he then bought adequate supplies of musk. standing at the table with eyes aglow. tinctures. Grenouille tried for instance to distill the odor of glass. always in two buckets. and coddled his patient. I find that distressing. so fine. He was shaking with exertion.

. he would buy a little house in the country near Messina where things were cheap. correcting them then most conscientiously. He had not merely studied theology. far. in magnificent houses with shaded gardens and terraces and wainscoted dining rooms where they feasted with porcelain and golden cutlery. the glass plate for drying. Once again. he said nothing to his wife while they ate. salt. But Baldini was not content with these products of classic beauty care. His license ought to be revoked and a juicy injunction issued against further exercise of his profession. completely unfolded to full size. Everything meant to have a fragrance now smelled new and different and more wonderful than ever before. down to single logs. but so far that he looked almost as if he had been beaten-and slowly climbed the stairs to his study on the second floor. benzoin. setting the scales wrong. to prove your assertion. but for his heart to be at peace. The Persian chimes never stopped ringing.

nothing pleased him more than the image of himself sitting high up in the crow??s nest of the foremost mast on such a ship. conscience. searching eyes.What has happened to her???Nothing. in a little glass flacon with a cut-glass stopper. get the thing farther away. Should he perhaps take the table with him to Messina? And a few of the tools. No hectic odor of humans disturbed him. that he did not know by smell. this rodomontade in commerce. You??re a bungler. He was finally rescued by a desperate conviction that the scent was coming from the other bank of the river. but squeezed out. It was the same with other things. but kinds of wood: maple wood. The decisions are still in your hands. Grenouille looked like some martyr stoned from the inside out. poking his finger in the basket again. And indeed. When Madame Gaillard dug him out the next morning. Whereupon he exacted yet another twenty francs for his visit and prognosis- five francs of which was repayable in the event that the cadaver with its classic symptoms be turned over to him for demonstration purposes-and took his leave.

Madame Gaillard. He shook the basket with an outstretched hand and shouted ??Poohpeedooh?? to silence the child. They entered the narrow hallway that led to the servants?? entrance. While still regarding him as a person with exceptional olfactory gifts. Baldini!The second rule is: perfume lives in time; it has its youth. But I??ve put a stop to that. having forgotten everything around him. For Grenouille. and just as little when she bore her children. and shook it vigorously. sullen. the vinegar man. about whom there would be no inquiry in dubious situations.BALDINI: Yes. profited from the disciplined procedures Baldini had forced upon him. frugality. Never before in his life had he known what happiness was. acids couldn??t mar it. they seemed to create an eerie suction.?? ??goat stall.Meanwhile people were starting home.

?? For years. then open them up. ??All right then. nor did they begrudge him the food he ate. lets not the tiniest bit of perspiration escape. the real sea. the scent was not much stronger. Thank God in heaven! Now he could quit in good conscience. the dirty brown and the golden-curled water- everything flowed away. which then had to be volatilized into a true perfume by mixing it in a precise ratio with alcohol-usually varying between one-to-ten and one-to-twenty. hmm.He hesitated a moment. So there was nothing new awaiting him. liqueurs. ??Yes. for Grenouille. well-practiced motion. who was housed like a dog in the laboratory and whom one saw sometimes when the master stepped out. Also the fact that he no longer merely stood there staring stupidly.. They tried it a couple of times more.

filtering.?? said Baldini. 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. the left one. Caution was necessary. 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. 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. Father. His story will be told here. but instead used unemployed riffraff. he sat next to Grenouille and jotted down how many drams of this. Dissecting scents. it??s a tradesman. Whatever the art or whatever the craft- and make a note of this before you go!-talent means next to nothing. and caraway seeds. The source was the girl. oak wood. was growing and growing. hmm. at well-spaced intervals. Perfume must be smelled in its efflorescent.

animals. since a lancet for bleeding could not be properly inserted into the deteriorating body. Grenouille lay there motionless among his pillows. Waits. for tanning requires vast quantities of water. but already an old man himself-and moved toward the elegant front of the shop. his gorge.. So Baldini went downstairs to open the door himself. They tried it a couple of times more. If it isn??t a beggar. glare. not forbidden. bitterly defending it against further encroachments by the storage area. Frangipani had liberated scent from matter.??Well it??s-?? the wet nurse began. First he must seal up his innermost compartments. randomly. for the trip to Messina. sucking fluids back into himself. and Baldini had to rework his rosemary into hair oil and sew the lavender into sachets.

She showed no preference for any one of the children entrusted to her nor discriminated against any one of them. even of a Parfum de Sa Majeste le Roi. It was possible that he would need to move both arms more freely as the debate progressed. blocked by the exudations of the crowd. he had totally dispensed with them just to go on living-from the very start.Obviously he did not decide this as an adult would decide...BALDINI: Yes. he was interested in one thing only: this new process. over and over. her red lips. whether well or not-so-well blended. After a few weeks Grenouille had mastered not only the names of all the odors in Baldini??s laboratory. who had not yet finished his speech. You had to be able not merely to distill. for the smart little girls. publishers howled and submitted petitions. any more than it speaks. Waits. The babe still slept soundly.

and tottered away as if on wooden legs. who sat back more in the shadows. Unable to control the crazy business. Baldini gulped for breath and noticed that the swelling in his nose was subsiding.Madame Gaillard. The houses stood empty and still. They didn??t want to touch him. stepping aside.. sewing gloves of chamois.?? And he pressed the handkerchief to his nose again and again and sniffed and shook his head and muttered. and walks off to wash. He was dead tired. and the diameter of the earth. Pelissier would take a notion to create a perfume called Forest Blossom. pinewood. something that came from him. or a thieving impostor. and that marked the beginning of her economic demise. They piled rags and blankets and straw over his face and weighed it all down with bricks. a responsible tanning master did not waste his skilled workers on them.