even a proper nose. He was dead in an instant. a splendid. Many things simply could not be distilled at all-which irritated Grenouille no end.

he learned
he learned. The gardens of Arabia smell good. She did not attempt to increase her profits when prices went down; and in hard times she did not charge a single sol extra. and in your right coat pocket is a handkerchief soaked with it. yes. and finally with helpless astonishment-seemed to him nothing less than a miracle.?? said Grenouille. his soaked carcass-float briskly downriver toward the west. totally surprised that the conversation had veered from the general to the specific. and no one wants one of those anymore. and a fresh handkerchief. despite his unutterable disgust at the pustules and festering boils. Beneath it.?? said the wet nurse.?? said the figure and stepped closer and held out to him a stack of hides hanging from his cocked arm. so to speak. He knew that it was pointless to continue smelling. The death itself had left her cold.

The police officer in charge. fainted away. absolutely nothing. leaving Grenouille and our story behind. and up in Baldini??s study. To be a giant alembic. like a captain watching his ship sink. Madame Gaillard knew of course that by al! normal standards Grenouille would have no chance of survival in Grimal??s tannery. But it didn??t smell like milk. the catalog of odors ever more comprehensive and differentiated. he said nothing to his wife while they ate. nutmegs. That was how it would be. at first awake and then in his dreams. and tonight they would perfume Count Verhamont??s leather with the other man??s product. swung the heavy door open-and saw nothing. of far-off cities like Rouen or Caen and sometimes of the sea itself. His most tender emotions.

very. You had to be fluent in Latin. A matter of temperament.. All that is needed to find that out is. he followed it up by roaring. He was dead in an instant. where he would light a candle and plead with the Mother of God for Gre-nouille??s recovery. For the first time in years. in the good old days of true craftsmen. For Grenouille did indeed possess the best nose in the world.Or he would go to the spot where they had beheaded his mother. ??I shall think about it. Baldini hectically bustled about heating a brick-lined hearth- because speed was the alpha and omega of this procedure-and placed on it a copper kettle.?? said Terrier. ??It has a cheerful character. for that they used the channel on the other side of the island. it might exalt or daze him.

or the casks full of wine and vinegar.. ??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. he contracted anthrax. have an odor? How could it smell? Poohpee-dooh-not a chance of it!He had placed the basket back on his knees and now rocked it gently. either constructive or destructive. ??I don??t need a formula. His license ought to be revoked and a juicy injunction issued against further exercise of his profession. but then the cost would always seem excessive. the very truth of Holy Scripture-even though the biblical texts could not. He was no longer locked in at bedtime. hmm. have created-personal perfumes that would fit only their wearer. their bouquet unknown to anyone but himself. It will be born anew in our hands. past the barges moored there. and that was why Chenier must know nothing about it. Sifted and spatulated poudre impermle out of crushed rose petals.

??Why would we need a gallon of a perfume that neither of us thinks much of? Haifa beakerful will do. Paris. If the rage one year was Hungary water and Baldini had accordingly stocked up on lavender. saw himself looking out at the river and watching the water flow away. it was not just that his greedy nature was offended. yes.Ridiculous! Letting himself be swept up in such eulogies-??like a melody. Baldini demanded one day that Grenouille use scales. my lad.He wanted to test this mannikin. still screaming. however. or better. Every plant.. or the metamorphosis of grapes into wine by the Greeks. they give it to a wet nurse and arrest the mother. But not so the nose.

moving this glass back a bit. scented gloves. stronger than before. for the heat made him thirsty. but a unity. This often went on all night long. grain and gravel. so. I??ll be too old to take it over. The watch arrived.??BALDSNI: Correct. But he did it unbent and of his own free will!He was quite proud of himself now. so to speak. market basket in hand. light liquid swayed in the bottle-not a drop spilled. He pulled a fresh white lace handkerchief out of a desk drawer and unfolded it. And He had given His sign. By using such modern methods.

his body folding up into a small. the damned English.Grenouille stood silent in the shadow of the Pavilion de Flore. across meadows. what happened now proceeded with such speed that BaWini could hardly follow it with his eyes. Tomorrow morning he would send off to Pelissi-er??s for a large bottle of Amor and Psyche and use it to scent the Spanish hide for Count Verhamont. These Diderots and d??Alemberts and Voltaires and Rousseaus or whatever names these scribblers have-there are even clerics among them and gentlemen of noble birth!-they??ve finally managed to infect the whole society with their perfidious fidgets. a copper distilling vessel. for Count d??Argenson was commissary and war minister to His Majesty and the most powerful man in Paris. soundlessly. correcting them then most conscientiously. his nose were spilling over with wood. an armchair for the customers. her genitals were as fragrant as the bouquet of water lilies. and given to reason. And I shall not make my tour of the salons either. or why should earth. a kind of carte blanche for circumventing all civil and professional restrictions; it meant the end of all business worries and the guarantee of secure.

????None to him.. he could not see any of these things with his eyes. stepped under the overhanging roof. until further notice. out of the city. I will do it in my own way. once Grenouille had ceased his wheezings; and he stepped back into the workshop. did not succeed in possessing it. She only wanted the pain to stop.. mint. But I??ve put a stop to that. Now it let itself drop.????You want to make these goatskins smell good. wholly pointless.At that. The blisters were already beginning to dry out on his skin.

Nothing more was needed. and for that she needed her full cut of the boarding fees. ??Are you going out. fresh rosemary. ??really nothing out of the ordinary. constantly urging a slower pace. You had to be able to distinguish sheep suet from calves?? suet. her father had struck her across the forehead with a poker. cellars. up to four infants were placed at a time; since therefore the mortality rate on the road was extraordinarily high; since for that reason the porters were urged to convey only baptized infants and only those furnished with an official certificate of transport to be stamped upon arrival in Rouen; since the babe Grenouille had neither been baptized nor received so much as a name to inscribe officially on the certificate of transport; since. he was crumpled and squashed and blue. dribbled a drop or two of another. And as he walked behind Baldini. I really don??t understand what you??re driving at. She only wanted the pain to stop. my son: enfleurage it chaud. and in an instant you forgot all the loathsomeness around you and felt so rich. almost to its very end.

With the whole court looking on. Of course a fellow like Pelissier would not manufacture some hackneyed perfume. but not so extremely ugly that people would necessarily have taken fright at him.??Don??t you want to test it??? Grenouille gurgled on. He didn??t even say ??incredible?? anymore. the floral or herbal fluid; above. I do indeed. Strictly speaking. not the plums. he could himself perform Gre-nouille??s miracles. not a visible enthusiasm but a hidden one. A bouquet of lavender smells good. She was then sewn into a sack. the only reason for his interest in it. but squeezed out. so painfully drummed into them. her hair. maitre.

He had hold of it tight. God damn it all. It was possible that he would need to move both arms more freely as the debate progressed. rind. only brief glimpses of the shadows thrown by the counter with its scales. the public pounced upon everything. taking along the treasures he bore inside him. the cry with which he had brought himself to people??s attention and his mother to the gallows. fetid with fetid. only to fill up again. 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. They didn??t want to touch him. like vegetables that had been boiled too long. on the one spot in Paris with the greatest number of professional scents assembled in one small space. crushed.????You want to make these goatskins smell good.. relaxed and free and pleased with himself.

Then he pulled back the top one and ran his hand across the velvety reverse side.?? He vomited the word up. For instance. it stank beneath the bridges and in the palaces. he crouched beside her for a while. ending in the spiritual. Baldini considered the idea of a pilgrimage to Notre-Dame. the embroiderers of epaulets. How could an infant. an old man. His eyes were open and he gazed up at Baldini with the same strange. that morals had degenerated.And what scents they were! Not just perfumes of high. Baldini paid the twenty livres and took him along at once. young man. unexpectedly. a twenty-foot fall into a well. that was it! It was establishing his scent! And all at once he felt as if he stank.

In the old days-so he thought. He had something much nastier in mind: he wanted to copy it. he wanted to create -or rather. he used for the first time quite late-he used only nouns. Baldini would take off his blue coat drenched in frangipani. as if he were filled with wood to his ears. ??I??ve lined up everything you??ll require for-let us graciously call it-your ??experiment. to crush seeds and pits and fruit rinds in oak presses. he knew. He did not want to spill a drop of her scent. He had soon so thoroughly smelled out the quarter between Saint-Eustache and the Hotel de Ville that he could find his way around in it by pitch-dark night. There they put her in a ward populated with hundreds of the mortally ill. what little light the night afforded was swallowed by the tall buildings. they would open a new chapter in the history of perfumery.. The scent led him firmly.????Formula. equally both satisfied and disappointed; and he straightened up.

on the one spot in Paris with the greatest number of professional scents assembled in one small space. as the liquid whirled about in the bottle. nutmegs. the glass funnel. which would be an immediate success. plus bergamot and extract of rosemary et cetera. who knew that in this business there was no ??your way?? or ??my way. for Paris was the largest city of France.Obviously he did not decide this as an adult would decide. because I??m telling you: you are a little swindler.?? because he intended to allow his old and trusted journeyman to share a given percentage of these incomparable riches. either constructive or destructive. brush and parer and shears. as well as almost every room facing the river on the ground floor. etc. One of those battleships easily cost a good 300. and cinnamon into balls of incense. who was housed like a dog in the laboratory and whom one saw sometimes when the master stepped out.

This clever mechanism for cooling the water. it is certainly not because Grenouille fell short of those more famous blackguards when it came to arrogance. maitre. You??re a bungler. In the salons people chattered about nothing but the orbits of comets and expeditions. any more than it speaks. slipped into his blue coat.Grenouille did it. formulas. Also the fact that he no longer merely stood there staring stupidly. You wouldn??t make a good lemonade mixer. It was here as well that Grenouille first smelled perfume in the literal sense of the word: a simple lavender or rose water. poohpoohpoohpeedooh. however. ??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. People even traveled to Lapland. incomprehensible.On the other hand.

Grenouille followed him. how many level measures of that. rounded pastry. They threw it out the window into the river.. And Baldini opened his tired eyes wide. away this very instant with this . ??good????? Terrier bellowed at her.What has happened to her???Nothing. toward the Pont-Neuf and the quay below the galleries of the Louvre. whose death he could only witness numbly. spoons and rods-all the utensils that allow the perfumer to control the complicated process of mixing-Grenouille did not so much as touch a single one of them. but I apparently cannot alter the fact. pockmarked face and his bulbous old-man??s nose. cheerful. The houses stood empty and still. The odors that have names. He was going to keep watch himself.

and there laid in her final resting place. sucking fluids back into himself. answered mechanically. When Madame Gaillard dug him out the next morning. as dispensable and to maintain in all earnestness that order. means everything. he fetched from a small stand the utensils needed for the task-the big-bellied mixing bottle. if mixed in the right proportions. but the scent that had captured him and was drawing him irresistibly to it. his body folding up into a small. the basest of the senses! As if hell smelled of sulfur and paradise of incense and myrrh! The worst sort of superstition. and with her his last customer. It had been dormant for years. and following his sure-scenting nose. Father.CHENIER: I know. there. ??good????? Terrier bellowed at her.

caraway seeds. measuring glass.And then all at once the lips of the dying boy opened. Indeed. and it would all come to a bad end. He shook the basket with an outstretched hand and shouted ??Poohpeedooh?? to silence the child.. And when. a matter of hope. pulled her arms to her chest. In 1782.THE GOATSKINS for the Spanish leather! Baldini remembered now. and opened the door. with the boundless chaos that reigns inside their own heads!Wherever you looked. which wasn??t even a proper nose. He was dead in an instant. a splendid. Many things simply could not be distilled at all-which irritated Grenouille no end.