Perfume. The story of a murderer

Baldini had thousands of them. His stock ranged from essences absolues-floral oils, tinctures, extracts, secretions, balms, resins, and other drugs in dry, liquid, or waxy form-through diverse pomades, pastes, powders, soaps, creams, sachets, bandolines, brilliantines, mustache waxes, wart removers, and beauty spots, all the way to bath oils, lotions, smelling salts, toilet vinegars, and countless genuine perfumes. But Baldini was not content with these products of classic beauty care. It was his ambition to assemble in his shop everything that had a scent or in some fashion contributed to the production of scent. And so in addition to incense pastilles, incense candles, and cords, there were also sundry spices, from anise seeds to zapota seeds, syrups, cordials, and fruit brandies, wines from Cyprus, Malaga, and Corinth, honeys, coffees, teas, candied and dried fruits, figs, bonbons, chocolates, chestnuts, and even pickled capers, cucumbers, and onions, and marinated tuna. Plus perfumed sealing waxes, stationery, lover’s ink scented with attar of roses, writing kits of Spanish leather, penholders of whjte sandalwood, caskets and chests of cedarwood, potpourris and bowls for flower petals, brass incense holders, crystal flacons and cruses with stoppers of cut amber, scented gloves, handkerchiefs, sewing cushions filled with mace, and musk-sprinkled wallpaper that could fill a room with scent for more than a century.

Naturally there was not room for all these wares in the splendid but small shop that opened onto the street (or onto the bridge), and so for lack of a cellar, storage rooms occupied not just the attic, but the whole second and third floors, as well as almost every room facing the river on the ground floor. The result was that an indescribable chaos of odors reigned in the House of Baldini. However exquisite the quality of individual items-for Baldini bought wares of only highest quality-the blend of odors was almost unbearable, as if each musician in a thousand-member orchestra were playing a different melody at fortissimo. Baldini and his assistants were themselves inured to this chaos, like aging orchestra conductors (all of whom are hard of hearing, of course); and even his wife, who lived on the fourth floor, bitterly defending it against further encroachments by the storage area, hardly noticed the many odors herself anymore. Not so the customer entering Baldini’s shop for the first time. The prevailing mishmash of odors hit him like a punch in the face. Depending on his constitution, it might exalt or daze him, but in any case caused such a confusion of senses that he often no longer knew what he had come for. Errand boys forgot their orders.

Belligerent gentlemen grew queasy. And many ladies took a spell, half-hysteric, half-claustrophobic, fainted away, and could be revived only with the most pungent smelling salts of clove oil, ammonia, and camphor.

Under such conditions, it was really not at all astonishing that the Persian chimes at the door of Giuseppe Baldini’s shop rang and the silver herons spewed less and less frequently.

Ten

“CHENIER!” BALDINI cried from behind the counter where for hours he had stood rigid as a pillar, staring at the door. “Put on your wig!” And out from among the kegs of olive oil and dangling Bayonne hams appeared Chenier-Baldini’s assistant, somewhat younger than the latter, but already an old man himself-and moved toward the elegant front of the shop. He pulled his wig from his coat pocket and shoved it on his head. “Are you going out, Monsieur Baldini?”

“No,” said Baldini. “I shall retire to my study for a few hours, and I do not wish to be disturbed under any circumstances.”

“Ah, I see! You are creating a new perfume.”

BALDSNI: Correct. With which to impregnate a Spanish hide for Count Verhamont. He wants something like… like… I think he said it’s called Amor and Psyche, and comes he says from that… that bungler in the rue Saint-Andre-des-Arts, that… that…

CHENIER: Pelissier.

BALDINI: Yes. Indeed. That’s the bungler’s name. Amor and Psyche, by Pelissier.-Do you know it?”

CHENIER: Yes, yes. I do indeed. You can smell it everywhere these days. Smell it on every street corner. But if you ask me-nothing special! It most certainly can’t be compared in any way with what you will create, Monsieur Baldini.

BALDSNI: Naturally not.

CHENIER: It’s a terribly common scent, this Amor and Psyche.

BALDINI: Vulgar?

CHENIER: Totally vulgar, like everything from Pelissier. I believe it contains lime oil.

BALDINI: Really? What else?

CHENIER: Essence of orange blossom perhaps. And maybe tincture of rosemary. But I can’t say for sure.

BALDINI: It’s of no consequence at all to me in any case.

CHENIER: Naturally not.

BALDINI: I could care less what that bungler Pelissier slops into his perfumes. I certainly would not take my inspiration from him, I assure you.

CHENIER: You’re absolutely right, monsieur.

BALDINI: As you know, I take my inspiration from no one. As you know,! create my own perfumes.