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People suspected the gypsies. Gypsies were capable of anything. Gypsies were known to weave carpets out of old clothes and to stuff their pillows with human hair and to make dolls out of the skin and teeth of the hanged. Only gypsies could be involved in such a perverse crime. There were, however, no gypsies around at the time, not a one near or far; gypsies had last come through the area in December.
For lack of gypsies, people decided to suspect the Italian migrant workers. But there weren’t any Italians around either, it was too early in the year for them; they would first arrive in the region in June, at the time of the jasmine harvest, so it could not have been the Italians either. Finally the wigmakers came under suspicion, and they were searched for the hair of the murdered girl. To no avail. Then it was the Jews who were suspect, then the monks of the Benedictine cloister, reputedly a lecherous lot-although all of them were well over seventy-then the Cistercians, then the Freemasons, then the lunatics from the Charite, then the charcoal burners, then the beggars, and last but not least the nobility, in particular the marquis of Cabris, for he had already been married three times and organized-so it was said-orgiastic black masses in his cellars, where he drank the blood of virgins to increase his potency. Of course nothing definite could be proved. No one had witnessed the murder, the clothes and hair of the dead woman were not found. After several weeks the police lieutenant halted his investigation.
In mid-June the Italians arrived, many with families, to hire themselves out as pickers. The farmers put them to work as usual, but, with the murder still on their minds, forbade their wives and daughters to have anything to do with them. You couldn’t be too cautious. For although the migrant workers were in fact not responsible for the actual murder, they could have been responsible for it on principle, and so it was better to be on one’s guard.
Not long after the beginning of the jasmine harvest, two more murders occurred. Again the victims were very lovely young girls, again of the languid, raven-haired sort, again they were found naked and shorn and lying in a flower field with the backs of their heads bludgeoned. Again there was no trace of the perpetrator. The news spread like wildfire, and there was a threat that hostile action might be taken against the migrants-when it was learned that both victims were Italians, the daughters of a Genoese day laborer.
And now fear spread over the countryside. People no longer knew against whom to direct their impotent rage. Although there were still those who suspected the lunatics or the cryptic marquis, no one really believed that, for the former were under guard day and night, and the latter had long since departed for Paris. So people huddled closer together. The farmers opened up their barns for the migrants, who until then had slept in the open fields. The townsfolk set up nightly patrols in every neighborhood. The police lieutenant reinforced the watch at the gates. But all these measures proved useless. A few days after the double murder, they found the body of yet another girl, abused in the same manner as the others. This time it was a Sardinian washerwoman from the bishop’s palace; she had been struck down near the great basin of the Fontaine de la Foux, directly before the gates of the town. And although at the insistence of the citizenry the consuls initiated still further measures-the tightest possible control at the gates, a reinforced nightwatch, a curfew for all female persons after nightfall-all that summer not a single week went by when the body of a young girl was not discovered. And they were always girls just approaching womanhood, and always very beautiful and usually dark, sugary types. Soon, however, the murderer was no longer rejecting the type of girl more common among the local population: soft, pale-skinned, and somewhat more full-bodied. Even brown-haired girls and some dark blondes-as long as they weren’t too skinny-were among the later victims. He tracked them down everywhere, not just in the open country around Grasse, but in the town itself, right in their homes. The daughter of a carpenter was found slain in her own room on the fifth floor, and no one in the house had heard the least noise, and although the dogs normally yelped the moment they picked up the scent of any stranger, not one of them had barked. The murderer seemed impalpable, incorporeal, like a ghost.
People were outraged and reviled the authorities. The least rumor caused mob scenes. A traveling salesman of love potions and other nostrums was almost massacred, for word spread that one of the ingredients in his remedies was female hair. Fires were set at both the Cabris mansion and the Hopital de la Charite. A servant returning home one night was shot down by his own master, the woolen draper Alexandre Misnard, who mistook him for the infamous murderer of young girls. Whoever could afford it sent his adolescent daughters to distant relatives or to boarding schools in Nice, Aix, or Marseille. The police lieutenant was removed from office at the insistence of the town council. His successor had the college of medicine examine the bodies of the shorn beauties to determine the state of their virginity. It was found that they had all remained untouched.
Strangely enough, this knowledge only increased the sense of horror, for everyone had secretly assumed that the girls had been ravished. People had at least known the murderer’s motive. Now they knew nothing at all, they were totally perplexed. And whoever believed in God sought succor in the prayer that at least his own house should be spared this visitation from hell.
The town council was a committee of thirty of the richest and most influential commoners and nobles in Grasse. The majority of them were enlightened and anticlerical, paid not the least attention to the bishop, and would have preferred to turn the cloisters and abbeys into warehouses or factories. In their distress, the proud, powerful men of the town council condescended to write an abject petition begging the bishop to curse and excommunicate this monster who murdered young girls and yet whom temporal powers could not capture, just as his illustrious predecessor had done in the year 1708, when terrible locusts had threatened the land. And indeed, at the end of September, the slayer of the young women of Grasse, having cut down no fewer than twenty-four of its most beautiful virgins out of every social class, was made anathema and excommunicated both in writing and from all the pulpits of the city, including a ban spoken by the bishop himself from the pulpit of Notre-Dame-du-Puy.
The result was conclusive. From one day to the next, the murders ceased. October and November passed with no corpses. At the start of December, reports came in from Grenoble that a murderer there was strangling young girls, then tearing their clothes to shreds and pulling their hair out by the handfuls. And although these coarse methods in no way squared with the cleanly executed crimes of the Grasse murderer, everyone was convinced that it was one and the same person. In their relief that the beast was no longer among them but instead ravaging Grenoble a good seven days’ journey distant, the citizens of Grasse crossed themselves three times over. They organized a torchlight procession in honor of the bishop and celebrated a mass of thanksgiving on December 24. On January 1, 1766, the tighter security measures were relaxed and the nighttime curfew for women was lifted. Normality returned to public and private life with incredible speed. Fear had melted into thin air, no one spoke of the terror that had ruled both town and counlryside only a few months before. Not even the families involved still spoke of it. It was as if the bishop’s curse had not only banned the murderer, but every memory of him. And the people were pleased that it was so.
But any man who still had a daughter just approaching that special age did not, even now, allow her to be without supervision; twilight brought misgivings, and each morning, when he found her healthy and cheerful, he rejoiced-though of course without actually admitting the reason why.
Forty-one
Forty-two
Forty-three
Forty-four
Forty-five
For lack of gypsies, people decided to suspect the Italian migrant workers. But there weren’t any Italians around either, it was too early in the year for them; they would first arrive in the region in June, at the time of the jasmine harvest, so it could not have been the Italians either. Finally the wigmakers came under suspicion, and they were searched for the hair of the murdered girl. To no avail. Then it was the Jews who were suspect, then the monks of the Benedictine cloister, reputedly a lecherous lot-although all of them were well over seventy-then the Cistercians, then the Freemasons, then the lunatics from the Charite, then the charcoal burners, then the beggars, and last but not least the nobility, in particular the marquis of Cabris, for he had already been married three times and organized-so it was said-orgiastic black masses in his cellars, where he drank the blood of virgins to increase his potency. Of course nothing definite could be proved. No one had witnessed the murder, the clothes and hair of the dead woman were not found. After several weeks the police lieutenant halted his investigation.
In mid-June the Italians arrived, many with families, to hire themselves out as pickers. The farmers put them to work as usual, but, with the murder still on their minds, forbade their wives and daughters to have anything to do with them. You couldn’t be too cautious. For although the migrant workers were in fact not responsible for the actual murder, they could have been responsible for it on principle, and so it was better to be on one’s guard.
Not long after the beginning of the jasmine harvest, two more murders occurred. Again the victims were very lovely young girls, again of the languid, raven-haired sort, again they were found naked and shorn and lying in a flower field with the backs of their heads bludgeoned. Again there was no trace of the perpetrator. The news spread like wildfire, and there was a threat that hostile action might be taken against the migrants-when it was learned that both victims were Italians, the daughters of a Genoese day laborer.
And now fear spread over the countryside. People no longer knew against whom to direct their impotent rage. Although there were still those who suspected the lunatics or the cryptic marquis, no one really believed that, for the former were under guard day and night, and the latter had long since departed for Paris. So people huddled closer together. The farmers opened up their barns for the migrants, who until then had slept in the open fields. The townsfolk set up nightly patrols in every neighborhood. The police lieutenant reinforced the watch at the gates. But all these measures proved useless. A few days after the double murder, they found the body of yet another girl, abused in the same manner as the others. This time it was a Sardinian washerwoman from the bishop’s palace; she had been struck down near the great basin of the Fontaine de la Foux, directly before the gates of the town. And although at the insistence of the citizenry the consuls initiated still further measures-the tightest possible control at the gates, a reinforced nightwatch, a curfew for all female persons after nightfall-all that summer not a single week went by when the body of a young girl was not discovered. And they were always girls just approaching womanhood, and always very beautiful and usually dark, sugary types. Soon, however, the murderer was no longer rejecting the type of girl more common among the local population: soft, pale-skinned, and somewhat more full-bodied. Even brown-haired girls and some dark blondes-as long as they weren’t too skinny-were among the later victims. He tracked them down everywhere, not just in the open country around Grasse, but in the town itself, right in their homes. The daughter of a carpenter was found slain in her own room on the fifth floor, and no one in the house had heard the least noise, and although the dogs normally yelped the moment they picked up the scent of any stranger, not one of them had barked. The murderer seemed impalpable, incorporeal, like a ghost.
People were outraged and reviled the authorities. The least rumor caused mob scenes. A traveling salesman of love potions and other nostrums was almost massacred, for word spread that one of the ingredients in his remedies was female hair. Fires were set at both the Cabris mansion and the Hopital de la Charite. A servant returning home one night was shot down by his own master, the woolen draper Alexandre Misnard, who mistook him for the infamous murderer of young girls. Whoever could afford it sent his adolescent daughters to distant relatives or to boarding schools in Nice, Aix, or Marseille. The police lieutenant was removed from office at the insistence of the town council. His successor had the college of medicine examine the bodies of the shorn beauties to determine the state of their virginity. It was found that they had all remained untouched.
Strangely enough, this knowledge only increased the sense of horror, for everyone had secretly assumed that the girls had been ravished. People had at least known the murderer’s motive. Now they knew nothing at all, they were totally perplexed. And whoever believed in God sought succor in the prayer that at least his own house should be spared this visitation from hell.
The town council was a committee of thirty of the richest and most influential commoners and nobles in Grasse. The majority of them were enlightened and anticlerical, paid not the least attention to the bishop, and would have preferred to turn the cloisters and abbeys into warehouses or factories. In their distress, the proud, powerful men of the town council condescended to write an abject petition begging the bishop to curse and excommunicate this monster who murdered young girls and yet whom temporal powers could not capture, just as his illustrious predecessor had done in the year 1708, when terrible locusts had threatened the land. And indeed, at the end of September, the slayer of the young women of Grasse, having cut down no fewer than twenty-four of its most beautiful virgins out of every social class, was made anathema and excommunicated both in writing and from all the pulpits of the city, including a ban spoken by the bishop himself from the pulpit of Notre-Dame-du-Puy.
The result was conclusive. From one day to the next, the murders ceased. October and November passed with no corpses. At the start of December, reports came in from Grenoble that a murderer there was strangling young girls, then tearing their clothes to shreds and pulling their hair out by the handfuls. And although these coarse methods in no way squared with the cleanly executed crimes of the Grasse murderer, everyone was convinced that it was one and the same person. In their relief that the beast was no longer among them but instead ravaging Grenoble a good seven days’ journey distant, the citizens of Grasse crossed themselves three times over. They organized a torchlight procession in honor of the bishop and celebrated a mass of thanksgiving on December 24. On January 1, 1766, the tighter security measures were relaxed and the nighttime curfew for women was lifted. Normality returned to public and private life with incredible speed. Fear had melted into thin air, no one spoke of the terror that had ruled both town and counlryside only a few months before. Not even the families involved still spoke of it. It was as if the bishop’s curse had not only banned the murderer, but every memory of him. And the people were pleased that it was so.
But any man who still had a daughter just approaching that special age did not, even now, allow her to be without supervision; twilight brought misgivings, and each morning, when he found her healthy and cheerful, he rejoiced-though of course without actually admitting the reason why.
Forty-one
THERE WAS one man in Grasse, however, who did not trust this peace. His name was Antoine Richis, he held the title of second consul, and he lived in a grand residence at the entrance to the rue Droite.
Richis was a widower and had a daughter named Laure. Although not yet forty years old and of undi-minished vigor, he intended to put off a second marriage for some time yet. First he wanted to find a husband for his daughter. And not the first comer, either, but a man of rank. There was a baron de Bouyon who had a son and an estate near Vence, a man of good reputation and miserable financial situation, with whom Richis had already concluded a contract concerning the future marriage of their children. Once he had married Laure off, he planned to put out his own courting feelers in the direction of the highly esteemed houses of Dree, Maubert, or Fontmichel-not because he was vain and would be damned if he didn’t get a noble bedmate, but because he wanted to found a dynasty and to put his own posterity on a track leading directly to the highest social and political influence. For that he needed at least two sons, one to take over his business, the other to pursue a law career leading to the parliament in Aix and advancement to the nobility. Given his present rank, however, he could hold out hopes for such success only if he managed intimately to unite his own person and family with provincial nobility.
Only one thing justified such high-soaring plans: his fabulous wealth. Antoine Richis was far and away the wealthiest citizen anywhere around. He possessed latifundia not only in the area of Grasse, where he planted oranges, oil, wheat, and hemp, but also near Vence and over toward Antibes, where he leased out his farms. He owned houses in Aix and houses in the country, owned shares in ships that traded with India, had a permanent office in Genoa, and was the largest wholesaler for scents, spices, oils, and leathers in France.
The most precious thing that Richis possessed, however, was his daughter. She was his only child, just turned sixteen, with auburn hair and green eyes. She had a face so charming that visitors of all ages and both sexes would stand stockstill at the sight of her, unable to pull their eyes away, practically licking that face with their eyes, the way tongues work at ice cream, with that typically stupid, single-minded expression on their faces that goes with concentrated licking. Even Richis would catch himself looking at his daughter for indefinite periods of time, a quarter of an hour, a half hour perhaps, forgetting the rest of the world, even his business-which otherwise did not happen even in his sleep-melting away in contemplation of this magnificent girl and afterwards unable to say what it was he had been doing. And of late-he noticed this with uneasiness-of an evening, when he brought her to her bed or sometimes of a morning when he went in to waken her and she still lay sleeping as if put to rest by God’s own hand and the forms of her hips and breasts were molded in the veil of her nightgown and her breath rose calm and hot from the frame of bosom, contoured shoulder, elbow, and smooth forearm in which she had laid her face-then he would feel an awful cramping in his stomach and his throat would seem too tight and he would swallow and, God help him, would curse himself for being this woman’s father and not some stranger, not some other man, before whom she lay as she lay now before him, and who then without scruple and full of desire could lie down next to her, on her, in her. And he broke out in a sweat, and his arms and legs trembled while he choked down this dreadful lust and bent down to wake her with a chaste fatherly kiss. During the year just past, at the time of the murders, these fatal temptations had not yet come over him. The magic that his daughter worked on him then-or so at least it seemed to him-had still been a childish magic. And thus he had not been seriously afraid that Laure would be one of the murderer’s victims, since everyone knew that he attacked neither children nor grown women, but exclusively ripening but virginal girls. He had indeed augmented the watch of his home, had had new grilles placed at the windows of the top floor, and had directed Laure’s maid to share her bedchamber with her. But he was loath to send her away as his peers had done with their daughters, some even with their entire families. He found such behavior despicable and unworthy of a member of the town council and second consul, who, he suggested, should be a model of composure, courage, and resolution to his fellow citizens. Besides which, he was a man who did not let his decisions be made for him by other people, nor by a crowd thrown into panic, and certainly not by some anonymous piece of criminal trash. And so all during those terrible days, he had been one of the few people in the town who were immune to the fever of fear and kept a cool head. But, strange to say, this had now changed. While others publicly celebrated the end of the rampage as if the murderer were already hanged and had soon fully forgotten about those dreadful days, fear crept into Antoine Richis’s heart like a foul poison. For a long time he would not admit that it was fear that caused him to delay trips that ought to have been made some time ago, or to be reluctant merely to leave the house, or to break off visits and meetings just so that he could quickly return home. He gave himself the excuse that he was out of sorts or overworked, but admitted as well that he was a bit concerned, as every father with a daughter of marriageable age is concerned, a thoroughly normal concern… Had not the fame of her beauty already gone out to the wider world? Did not people stretch their necks even now when he accompanied her to church on Sundays? Were not certain gentlemen on the council already making advances, in their own names or in those of their sons…?
Richis was a widower and had a daughter named Laure. Although not yet forty years old and of undi-minished vigor, he intended to put off a second marriage for some time yet. First he wanted to find a husband for his daughter. And not the first comer, either, but a man of rank. There was a baron de Bouyon who had a son and an estate near Vence, a man of good reputation and miserable financial situation, with whom Richis had already concluded a contract concerning the future marriage of their children. Once he had married Laure off, he planned to put out his own courting feelers in the direction of the highly esteemed houses of Dree, Maubert, or Fontmichel-not because he was vain and would be damned if he didn’t get a noble bedmate, but because he wanted to found a dynasty and to put his own posterity on a track leading directly to the highest social and political influence. For that he needed at least two sons, one to take over his business, the other to pursue a law career leading to the parliament in Aix and advancement to the nobility. Given his present rank, however, he could hold out hopes for such success only if he managed intimately to unite his own person and family with provincial nobility.
Only one thing justified such high-soaring plans: his fabulous wealth. Antoine Richis was far and away the wealthiest citizen anywhere around. He possessed latifundia not only in the area of Grasse, where he planted oranges, oil, wheat, and hemp, but also near Vence and over toward Antibes, where he leased out his farms. He owned houses in Aix and houses in the country, owned shares in ships that traded with India, had a permanent office in Genoa, and was the largest wholesaler for scents, spices, oils, and leathers in France.
The most precious thing that Richis possessed, however, was his daughter. She was his only child, just turned sixteen, with auburn hair and green eyes. She had a face so charming that visitors of all ages and both sexes would stand stockstill at the sight of her, unable to pull their eyes away, practically licking that face with their eyes, the way tongues work at ice cream, with that typically stupid, single-minded expression on their faces that goes with concentrated licking. Even Richis would catch himself looking at his daughter for indefinite periods of time, a quarter of an hour, a half hour perhaps, forgetting the rest of the world, even his business-which otherwise did not happen even in his sleep-melting away in contemplation of this magnificent girl and afterwards unable to say what it was he had been doing. And of late-he noticed this with uneasiness-of an evening, when he brought her to her bed or sometimes of a morning when he went in to waken her and she still lay sleeping as if put to rest by God’s own hand and the forms of her hips and breasts were molded in the veil of her nightgown and her breath rose calm and hot from the frame of bosom, contoured shoulder, elbow, and smooth forearm in which she had laid her face-then he would feel an awful cramping in his stomach and his throat would seem too tight and he would swallow and, God help him, would curse himself for being this woman’s father and not some stranger, not some other man, before whom she lay as she lay now before him, and who then without scruple and full of desire could lie down next to her, on her, in her. And he broke out in a sweat, and his arms and legs trembled while he choked down this dreadful lust and bent down to wake her with a chaste fatherly kiss. During the year just past, at the time of the murders, these fatal temptations had not yet come over him. The magic that his daughter worked on him then-or so at least it seemed to him-had still been a childish magic. And thus he had not been seriously afraid that Laure would be one of the murderer’s victims, since everyone knew that he attacked neither children nor grown women, but exclusively ripening but virginal girls. He had indeed augmented the watch of his home, had had new grilles placed at the windows of the top floor, and had directed Laure’s maid to share her bedchamber with her. But he was loath to send her away as his peers had done with their daughters, some even with their entire families. He found such behavior despicable and unworthy of a member of the town council and second consul, who, he suggested, should be a model of composure, courage, and resolution to his fellow citizens. Besides which, he was a man who did not let his decisions be made for him by other people, nor by a crowd thrown into panic, and certainly not by some anonymous piece of criminal trash. And so all during those terrible days, he had been one of the few people in the town who were immune to the fever of fear and kept a cool head. But, strange to say, this had now changed. While others publicly celebrated the end of the rampage as if the murderer were already hanged and had soon fully forgotten about those dreadful days, fear crept into Antoine Richis’s heart like a foul poison. For a long time he would not admit that it was fear that caused him to delay trips that ought to have been made some time ago, or to be reluctant merely to leave the house, or to break off visits and meetings just so that he could quickly return home. He gave himself the excuse that he was out of sorts or overworked, but admitted as well that he was a bit concerned, as every father with a daughter of marriageable age is concerned, a thoroughly normal concern… Had not the fame of her beauty already gone out to the wider world? Did not people stretch their necks even now when he accompanied her to church on Sundays? Were not certain gentlemen on the council already making advances, in their own names or in those of their sons…?
Forty-two
BUT, THEN, one day in March, Richis was sitting in the salon and watched as Laure walked out into the garden. She was wearing a blue dress, her red hair falling down over it and blazing in the sunlight-he had never seen her look so beautiful. She disappeared behind a hedge. And it took about two heartbeats longer than he had expected before she emerged again-and he was frightened to death, for during those two heartbeats he thought he had lost her forever.
That same night he awoke out of a terrifying dream, the details of which he could no longer remember, but it had had to do with Laure, and he burst into her room convinced that she was dead, lay there in her bed murdered, violated, and shorn-and found her unharmed.
He went back to his chamber, bathed in sweat and trembling with agitation, no, not with agitation, but with fear, for he finally admitted it to himself: it was naked fear that had seized him, and in admitting it he grew calmer and his thoughts clearer. To be honest, he had not believed in the efficacy of the bishop’s anathema from the start, nor that the murderer was now prowling about Grenoble, nor that he had ever left town. No, he was still living here, among the citizens of Grasse, and at some point he would strike again. Richis had seen several of the girls murdered during August and September. The sight had horrified him, and at the same time, he had to admit, fascinated him, for they all, each in her own special way, had been of dazzling beauty. He never would have thought that there was so much unrecognized beauty in Grasse. The murderer had opened his eyes. The murderer possessed exquisite taste. And he had a system. It was not just that all the murders had been carried out in the same efficient manner, but the very choice of victims betrayed intentions almost economical in their planning. To be sure, Richis did not know what the murderer actually craved from his victims, since he could not have robbed them of the best that they offered-their beauty and the charm of youth… or could he? In any case, it seemed to him, as absurd as it sounded, that the murderer was not a destructive personality, but rather a careful collector. For if one imagined-and so Richis imagined-all the victims not as single individuals, but as parts of some higher principle and thought of each one’s characteristics as merged in some idealistic fashion into a unifying whole, then the picture assembled out of such mosaic pieces would be the picture of absolute beauty, and the magic that radiated from it would no longer be of human, but of divine origin. (As we can see, Richis was an enlightened thinker who did not shrink from blasphemous conclusions, and though he was not thinking in olfactory categories, but rather in visual ones, he was nevertheless very near the truth.) Assuming then-Richis continued in his thoughts -that the murderer was just such a collector of beauty and was working on the picture of perfection, even if only in the fantasy of his sick brain; assuming, moreover, that he was the man of sublime taste and perfect methods that he indeed appeared to be-then one could not assume that he would waive claim to the most precious component on earth needed for his picture: the beauty of Laure. His entire previous homicidal work would be worth nothing without her. She was the keystone to his building.
As he drew this horrifying conclusion, Richis was sitting in his nightshirt on the edge of his bed, and he was amazed at how calm he had become. He no longer felt chilled, was no longer trembling. The vague fear that had plagued him for weeks had vanished and was replaced by the awareness of a specific danger: Laure had quite obviously been the goal of all the murderer’s endeavors from the beginning. And all the other murders were adjuncts to the last, crowning murder. It remained quite unclear what material purpose these murders were intended to serve or if they even had one at all. But Richis had perceived the essence of the matter: the murderer’s systematic method and his idealistic motive. The longer he thought about it, the better both of these pleased him and the greater his admiration for the murderer-an admiration, admittedly, that reflected back upon him as would a polished mirror, for after all, it was he, Richis, who had picked up his opponent’s trail with his own refined and analytical powers of reasoning.
If he, Richis, had been the murderer and were himself possessed by the murderer’s passions and ideas, he would not have been able to proceed in any other fashion than had been employed thus far, and like him, he would do his utmost to crown his mad work with the murder of the unique and splendid Laure.
This last thought appealed to him especially. Because he was in the position to put himself inside the mind of the would-be murderer of his daughter, he had made himself vastly superior to the murderer. For all his intelligence, that much was certain, the murderer was not in the position to put himself inside Richis’s mind-if only because he could not even begin to suspect that Richis had long since imagined himself in the murderer’s own situation. This was fundamentally no different from how things worked in business-mutatis mutandis, to be sure. You were master of a competitor whose intentions you had seen through; there was no way he could get the better of you-not if your name was Antoine Richis, and you were a natural fighter, a seasoned fighter. After all, the largest wholesale perfume business in France, his wealth, his office as second consul, these had not fallen into his lap as gracious gifts, but he had fought for them, with doggedness and deceit, recognizing dangers ahead of time, shrewdly guessing his competitors’ plans, and outdistancing his opponents. And in just the same way he would achieve his future goals, power and noble rank for his heirs. And in no other way would he counter the plans of the murderer, his competitor for the possession of Laure-if only because Laure was also the keystone in the edifice of his, of Richis’s, own plans. He loved her, certainly; but he needed her as well. And he would let no one wrest from him whatever it was he needed to realize his own highest ambitions-he would hold on tooth and claw to that.
He felt better now. Having succeeded by these nocturnal deliberations in bringing his struggle with the demon down to the level of a business rivalry, he felt fresh courage, indeed arrogance, take hold of him.
The last remnants of fear were gone, the despondency and anxious care that had tormented him into doddering senility had vanished, the fog of gloomy forebodings in which he had tapped about for weeks had lifted. He found himself on familiar terrain and felt himself equal to every challenge.
That same night he awoke out of a terrifying dream, the details of which he could no longer remember, but it had had to do with Laure, and he burst into her room convinced that she was dead, lay there in her bed murdered, violated, and shorn-and found her unharmed.
He went back to his chamber, bathed in sweat and trembling with agitation, no, not with agitation, but with fear, for he finally admitted it to himself: it was naked fear that had seized him, and in admitting it he grew calmer and his thoughts clearer. To be honest, he had not believed in the efficacy of the bishop’s anathema from the start, nor that the murderer was now prowling about Grenoble, nor that he had ever left town. No, he was still living here, among the citizens of Grasse, and at some point he would strike again. Richis had seen several of the girls murdered during August and September. The sight had horrified him, and at the same time, he had to admit, fascinated him, for they all, each in her own special way, had been of dazzling beauty. He never would have thought that there was so much unrecognized beauty in Grasse. The murderer had opened his eyes. The murderer possessed exquisite taste. And he had a system. It was not just that all the murders had been carried out in the same efficient manner, but the very choice of victims betrayed intentions almost economical in their planning. To be sure, Richis did not know what the murderer actually craved from his victims, since he could not have robbed them of the best that they offered-their beauty and the charm of youth… or could he? In any case, it seemed to him, as absurd as it sounded, that the murderer was not a destructive personality, but rather a careful collector. For if one imagined-and so Richis imagined-all the victims not as single individuals, but as parts of some higher principle and thought of each one’s characteristics as merged in some idealistic fashion into a unifying whole, then the picture assembled out of such mosaic pieces would be the picture of absolute beauty, and the magic that radiated from it would no longer be of human, but of divine origin. (As we can see, Richis was an enlightened thinker who did not shrink from blasphemous conclusions, and though he was not thinking in olfactory categories, but rather in visual ones, he was nevertheless very near the truth.) Assuming then-Richis continued in his thoughts -that the murderer was just such a collector of beauty and was working on the picture of perfection, even if only in the fantasy of his sick brain; assuming, moreover, that he was the man of sublime taste and perfect methods that he indeed appeared to be-then one could not assume that he would waive claim to the most precious component on earth needed for his picture: the beauty of Laure. His entire previous homicidal work would be worth nothing without her. She was the keystone to his building.
As he drew this horrifying conclusion, Richis was sitting in his nightshirt on the edge of his bed, and he was amazed at how calm he had become. He no longer felt chilled, was no longer trembling. The vague fear that had plagued him for weeks had vanished and was replaced by the awareness of a specific danger: Laure had quite obviously been the goal of all the murderer’s endeavors from the beginning. And all the other murders were adjuncts to the last, crowning murder. It remained quite unclear what material purpose these murders were intended to serve or if they even had one at all. But Richis had perceived the essence of the matter: the murderer’s systematic method and his idealistic motive. The longer he thought about it, the better both of these pleased him and the greater his admiration for the murderer-an admiration, admittedly, that reflected back upon him as would a polished mirror, for after all, it was he, Richis, who had picked up his opponent’s trail with his own refined and analytical powers of reasoning.
If he, Richis, had been the murderer and were himself possessed by the murderer’s passions and ideas, he would not have been able to proceed in any other fashion than had been employed thus far, and like him, he would do his utmost to crown his mad work with the murder of the unique and splendid Laure.
This last thought appealed to him especially. Because he was in the position to put himself inside the mind of the would-be murderer of his daughter, he had made himself vastly superior to the murderer. For all his intelligence, that much was certain, the murderer was not in the position to put himself inside Richis’s mind-if only because he could not even begin to suspect that Richis had long since imagined himself in the murderer’s own situation. This was fundamentally no different from how things worked in business-mutatis mutandis, to be sure. You were master of a competitor whose intentions you had seen through; there was no way he could get the better of you-not if your name was Antoine Richis, and you were a natural fighter, a seasoned fighter. After all, the largest wholesale perfume business in France, his wealth, his office as second consul, these had not fallen into his lap as gracious gifts, but he had fought for them, with doggedness and deceit, recognizing dangers ahead of time, shrewdly guessing his competitors’ plans, and outdistancing his opponents. And in just the same way he would achieve his future goals, power and noble rank for his heirs. And in no other way would he counter the plans of the murderer, his competitor for the possession of Laure-if only because Laure was also the keystone in the edifice of his, of Richis’s, own plans. He loved her, certainly; but he needed her as well. And he would let no one wrest from him whatever it was he needed to realize his own highest ambitions-he would hold on tooth and claw to that.
He felt better now. Having succeeded by these nocturnal deliberations in bringing his struggle with the demon down to the level of a business rivalry, he felt fresh courage, indeed arrogance, take hold of him.
The last remnants of fear were gone, the despondency and anxious care that had tormented him into doddering senility had vanished, the fog of gloomy forebodings in which he had tapped about for weeks had lifted. He found himself on familiar terrain and felt himself equal to every challenge.
Forty-three
RELIEVED, ALMOST elated, he sprang from his bed, pulled the bell rope, and ordered the drowsy valet who staggered into his room to pack clothes and provisions because at daybreak he intended to set out for Grenoble in the company of his daughter. Then he dressed and chased the rest of the servants from their beds.
In the middle of the night, the house on the rue Droite awoke and bustled with life. The fire blazed up in the kitchen, excited maids scurried along the corridors, servants dashed up and down the stairs, in the vaulted cellars the keys of the steward rattled, in the courtyard torches shone, grooms ran among the horses, others tugged mules from their stalls, there was bridling and saddling and running and loading— one would have almost believed that the Austro-Sardinian hordes were on the march, pillaging and torching, just as in 1746, and that the lord of the manor was mobilizing to flee in panic. Not at all! The lord of the manor was sitting at his office desk, as sovereign as a marshal of France, drinking cafe au lait, and providing instructions for the constant stream of domestics barging in on him. All the while, he wrote letters to the mayor, to the first consul, to his secretary, to his solicitor, to his banker in Marseille, to the baron de Bouyon, and to diverse business partners.
By around six that morning, he had completed his correspondence and given all the orders necessary to carry out his plans. He tucked away two small traveling pistols, buckled on his money belt, and locked his desk. Then he went to awaken his daughter.
By eight o’clock, the little caravan was on the move. Richis rode at its head; he was a splendid sight in his gold-braided, burgundy coat beneath a black riding coat and black hat with jaunty feathers. He was followed by his daughter, dressed less showily, but so radiantly beautiful that the people along the street and at the windows had eyes only for her, their fervent ah’s and oh’s passing through the crowd while the men doffed their hats-apparently for the second consul, but in reality for her, the regal woman. Then, almost unnoticed, came her maid, then Richis’s valet with two packhorses-the notoriously bad condition of the road to Grenoble meant that a wagon could not be used-and the end of the parade was drawn up by a dozen mules laden with all sorts of stuff and supervised by two grooms. At the Porte du Cours the watch presented arms and only let them drop when the last mule had tramped by. Children ran behind them for a good little while, waving at the baggage crew as they slowly moved up the steep, winding road into the mountains.
The departure of Antoine Richis and his daughter made a strange but deep impression on people. It was as if they had witnessed some archaic sacrificial procession. The word spread that Richis was going to Grenoble, to the very city where the monster who murdered young girls was now residing. People did not know what to think about that. Did what Richis was doing show criminal negligence or admirable courage? Was he daring or placating the gods? They had only the vague foreboding that they had just seen this beautiful girl with the red hair for the last time. They suspected that Laure Richis might be lost.
This suspicion would prove correct, although the presumptions it was based upon were completely false. Richis was not heading for Grenoble at all. The pompous departure was nothing but a diversionary tactic. A mile and a half northwest of Grasse, near the village of Saint-Vallier, he ordered a halt. He handed his valet letters of attorney and transmittal and ordered him to bring the mule train and grooms to Grenoble by himself.
He, however, turned off with Laure and her maid in the direction of Cabris, where they rested at midday, and then rode straight across the mountains of the Tanneron toward the south. The path was an extremely arduous one, but it allowed them to circumvent Grasse and its basin in a great arc and to arrive on the coast by evening without being recognized… The following day-according to Richis’s plan-he would ferry across with Laure to the lies de Lerins, on the smaller of which was located the well-fortified monastery of Saint-Honorat. It was managed by a handful of elderly but quite ablebodied monks whom Richis knew very well, since for years he had bought and resold the monastery’s total production of eucalyptus cordial, pine nuts, and cypress oil. And there in the monastery of Saint-Honorat-which except for the prison of Chateau d’lf and the state prison on the He Sainte-Marguerite was probably the safest place in the Provence-he intended to lodge his daughter for the present. But he would immediately return to the mainland, this time circumventing Grasse on the east via Antibes and Cagnes, and arrive in Vence by evening of the same day. He had ordered his secretary to proceed there in order to prepare the agreement with baron de Bouyon concerning the marriage of their children Laure and Alphonse. He hoped to make Bouyon an offer that he could not refuse: assumption of his debts up to forty thousand livres, a dowry consisting of an equal sum as well as diverse landhold-ings and an oil mill near Maganosc, a yearly income of three thousand livres for the young couple. Richis’s only conditions were that the marriage should take place within ten days and be consummated on the wedding day, and that the couple should thereafter take up residence in Vence.
Richis knew that in acting so hastily he was driving the price excessively high for the union of his house with the house of Bouyon. He would have got it cheaper had he waited longer. The baron would have begged for permission to raise the social rank of the daughter of a bourgeois wholesaler through a marriage to his son, for the fame of Laure’s beauty would only grow, just as would Richis’s wealth and Bouyon’s financial miseries. But what did that matter! His opponent in this deal was not the baron, but the unknown murderer. He was the one whose business had to be spoiled. A married woman, deflowered and if possible already pregnant, would no longer fit into his exclusive gallery. The last mosaic stone would be tarnished, Laure would have lost all value for the murderer, his enterprise would have failed. And he was to feel his defeat! Richis wanted to hold the wedding ceremony in Grasse, with great pomp and open to the public. And even if he could not know his adversary, would never know him, he would take personal pleasure in knowing that he was in attendance at the event and would have to watch with his own eyes as that which he most desired was snatched away from under his nose.
The plan was nicely thought out. And once again we must admire Richis’s acumen for coming so close to the truth. For in point of fact the marriage of Laure Richis to the son of the baron de Bouyon would have meant a devastating defeat for the murderer of the maidens of Grasse. But the plan was not yet carried out. Richis had not yet rescued his daughter by marrying her off. He had not yet ferried her across to the safety of the monastery of Saint-Honorat. The three riders were still passing through the inhospitable mountains of the Tanneron. Sometimes the path was so bad that they had to dismount from their horses. It was all going too slowly. By evening, they hoped to reach the sea near La Napoule, a small town west of Cannes.
In the middle of the night, the house on the rue Droite awoke and bustled with life. The fire blazed up in the kitchen, excited maids scurried along the corridors, servants dashed up and down the stairs, in the vaulted cellars the keys of the steward rattled, in the courtyard torches shone, grooms ran among the horses, others tugged mules from their stalls, there was bridling and saddling and running and loading— one would have almost believed that the Austro-Sardinian hordes were on the march, pillaging and torching, just as in 1746, and that the lord of the manor was mobilizing to flee in panic. Not at all! The lord of the manor was sitting at his office desk, as sovereign as a marshal of France, drinking cafe au lait, and providing instructions for the constant stream of domestics barging in on him. All the while, he wrote letters to the mayor, to the first consul, to his secretary, to his solicitor, to his banker in Marseille, to the baron de Bouyon, and to diverse business partners.
By around six that morning, he had completed his correspondence and given all the orders necessary to carry out his plans. He tucked away two small traveling pistols, buckled on his money belt, and locked his desk. Then he went to awaken his daughter.
By eight o’clock, the little caravan was on the move. Richis rode at its head; he was a splendid sight in his gold-braided, burgundy coat beneath a black riding coat and black hat with jaunty feathers. He was followed by his daughter, dressed less showily, but so radiantly beautiful that the people along the street and at the windows had eyes only for her, their fervent ah’s and oh’s passing through the crowd while the men doffed their hats-apparently for the second consul, but in reality for her, the regal woman. Then, almost unnoticed, came her maid, then Richis’s valet with two packhorses-the notoriously bad condition of the road to Grenoble meant that a wagon could not be used-and the end of the parade was drawn up by a dozen mules laden with all sorts of stuff and supervised by two grooms. At the Porte du Cours the watch presented arms and only let them drop when the last mule had tramped by. Children ran behind them for a good little while, waving at the baggage crew as they slowly moved up the steep, winding road into the mountains.
The departure of Antoine Richis and his daughter made a strange but deep impression on people. It was as if they had witnessed some archaic sacrificial procession. The word spread that Richis was going to Grenoble, to the very city where the monster who murdered young girls was now residing. People did not know what to think about that. Did what Richis was doing show criminal negligence or admirable courage? Was he daring or placating the gods? They had only the vague foreboding that they had just seen this beautiful girl with the red hair for the last time. They suspected that Laure Richis might be lost.
This suspicion would prove correct, although the presumptions it was based upon were completely false. Richis was not heading for Grenoble at all. The pompous departure was nothing but a diversionary tactic. A mile and a half northwest of Grasse, near the village of Saint-Vallier, he ordered a halt. He handed his valet letters of attorney and transmittal and ordered him to bring the mule train and grooms to Grenoble by himself.
He, however, turned off with Laure and her maid in the direction of Cabris, where they rested at midday, and then rode straight across the mountains of the Tanneron toward the south. The path was an extremely arduous one, but it allowed them to circumvent Grasse and its basin in a great arc and to arrive on the coast by evening without being recognized… The following day-according to Richis’s plan-he would ferry across with Laure to the lies de Lerins, on the smaller of which was located the well-fortified monastery of Saint-Honorat. It was managed by a handful of elderly but quite ablebodied monks whom Richis knew very well, since for years he had bought and resold the monastery’s total production of eucalyptus cordial, pine nuts, and cypress oil. And there in the monastery of Saint-Honorat-which except for the prison of Chateau d’lf and the state prison on the He Sainte-Marguerite was probably the safest place in the Provence-he intended to lodge his daughter for the present. But he would immediately return to the mainland, this time circumventing Grasse on the east via Antibes and Cagnes, and arrive in Vence by evening of the same day. He had ordered his secretary to proceed there in order to prepare the agreement with baron de Bouyon concerning the marriage of their children Laure and Alphonse. He hoped to make Bouyon an offer that he could not refuse: assumption of his debts up to forty thousand livres, a dowry consisting of an equal sum as well as diverse landhold-ings and an oil mill near Maganosc, a yearly income of three thousand livres for the young couple. Richis’s only conditions were that the marriage should take place within ten days and be consummated on the wedding day, and that the couple should thereafter take up residence in Vence.
Richis knew that in acting so hastily he was driving the price excessively high for the union of his house with the house of Bouyon. He would have got it cheaper had he waited longer. The baron would have begged for permission to raise the social rank of the daughter of a bourgeois wholesaler through a marriage to his son, for the fame of Laure’s beauty would only grow, just as would Richis’s wealth and Bouyon’s financial miseries. But what did that matter! His opponent in this deal was not the baron, but the unknown murderer. He was the one whose business had to be spoiled. A married woman, deflowered and if possible already pregnant, would no longer fit into his exclusive gallery. The last mosaic stone would be tarnished, Laure would have lost all value for the murderer, his enterprise would have failed. And he was to feel his defeat! Richis wanted to hold the wedding ceremony in Grasse, with great pomp and open to the public. And even if he could not know his adversary, would never know him, he would take personal pleasure in knowing that he was in attendance at the event and would have to watch with his own eyes as that which he most desired was snatched away from under his nose.
The plan was nicely thought out. And once again we must admire Richis’s acumen for coming so close to the truth. For in point of fact the marriage of Laure Richis to the son of the baron de Bouyon would have meant a devastating defeat for the murderer of the maidens of Grasse. But the plan was not yet carried out. Richis had not yet rescued his daughter by marrying her off. He had not yet ferried her across to the safety of the monastery of Saint-Honorat. The three riders were still passing through the inhospitable mountains of the Tanneron. Sometimes the path was so bad that they had to dismount from their horses. It was all going too slowly. By evening, they hoped to reach the sea near La Napoule, a small town west of Cannes.
Forty-four
AT THE SAME time that Laure Richis and her father were leaving Grasse, Grenouille was at the other end of town in the Arnulfi workshop macerating jonquils. He was alone and he was in good spirits. His days in Grasse were coming to an end. His day of triumph was imminent. Out in his cabin was a crate padded with cotton, in it were twenty-four tiny flacons filled with drops of the congealed aura of twenty-four virgins-precious essences that Grenouille had produced over the last year by cold-oil enfleurage of their bodies, digestion of their hair and clothes, lavage, and distillation. And the twenty-fifth, the most precious and important of all, he planned to fetch today. For his final fishing expedition, he had at the ready a small pot of oils purified several times over, a cloth of finest linen, and a demijohn of high-proof alcohol. The terrain had been studied down to the last detail. The moon was new.
He knew that any attempt to break into the well-protected mansion on the rue Droite was pointless. Which was why he planned, just as dusk fell and before the doors were closed, to sneak in under his cover of odorlessness, which like a magic cape deprived man and beast of their perceptive faculties, and there to hide in some nook of the house. Then later, when everyone was asleep, he would follow the compass of his nose through the darkness and climb up to the chamber that held his treasure. He would set to work on it with his oil-drenched cloths right then and there. All that he would take with him would be, as usual, the hair and clothes, since these could be washed directly in rectified spirit, which could be done more conveniently in the workshop. He estimated it would take an additional night to complete the production of the pomade and to distill the concentrate. And if everything went well-and he had no reason to doubt that everything would go well— then by the day after tomorrow he would possess all of the essences needed for the best perfume in the world, and he would leave Grasse as the world’s most fragrant human being.
Around noon he was finished with his jonquils. He doused the fire, covered the pot of oil, and stepped outside the workshop to cool off. The wind was from the west.
With his very first breath, he knew something was wrong. The atmosphere was not as it should be. In the town’s aromatic garb, that veil of many thousands of woven threads, the golden thread was missing. During the last few weeks the fragrance of that thread had grown so strong that Grenouilie had clearly discerned it from his cabin on the far side of the town. Now it was gone, vanished, untraceable despite the most intensive sniffing. Grenouilie was almost paralyzed with fright.
She is dead, he thought. Then, more terrifying still: Someone else has got to her before me. Someone else has plucked my flower and taken its odor for himself! He could not so much as scream, the shock was too great for that, but he could produce tears that welled up in the corners of his eyes and suddenly streamed down both sides of his nose.
Then Druot, returning home from the Quatre Dauphins for lunch, remarked in passing that early this morning the second consul had left for Grenoble together with twelve mules and his daughter. Gre-nouille forced back the tears and ran off, straight through town to the Porte du Cours. He stopped to sniff in the square before the gate. And in the pure west wind, unsullied by the odors of the town, he did indeed find his golden thread again, thin and fragile, but absolutely unmistakable. The precious scent, however, was not blowing from the northwest, where the road leads toward Grenoble, but more from the direction of Cabris-if not directly out of the southwest.
Grenouille asked the watch which road the second consul had taken. The guard pointed north. Not the road to Cabris? Or the other one, that went south toward Auribeau and La Napoule? Definitely not, said the guard, he had watched with his own eyes.
Grenouille ran back through town to his cabin, packed linen, pomade pot, spatula, scissors, and a small, smooth club of olivewood into his knapsack and promptly took to the road-not the road to Grenoble, but the one to which his nose directed him: to the south.
This road, the direct road to La Napoule, led along the foothills of the Tanneron, through the river valleys of the Frayere and Siagne. It was an easy walk. Grenouille made rapid progress. As Auribeau emerged on his right, clinging to the mountains above him, he could smell that he had almost caught up with the runaways. A little later and he had drawn even with them. He could now smell each one, could smell the aroma of their horses. At most they were no more than a half mile west of him, somewhere in the forests of the Tanneron. They were holding course southwards, toward the sea. Just as he was.
Around five o’clock that evening, Grenouille reached La Napoule. He went to the inn, ate, and asked for cheap lodging. He was a journeyman tanner from Nice, he said, on his way to Marseille. He could spend the night in a stall, they told him. There he lay down in a corner and rested. He could smell the three riders approaching. He need only wait.
Two hours later-it was deep dusk by then-they arrived. To preserve their disguise, they had changed costumes. The two women now wore dark cloaks and veils, Richis a black frock coat. He identified himself as a nobleman on his way from Castellane; in the morning he wanted to be ferried over to the lies de LSrins, the innkeeper should make arrangements for a boat to be ready by sunrise. Were there any other guests in the house besides himself and his people? No, said the innkeeper, only a journeyman tanner from Nice who was spending the night in a stall.
Richis sent the women to their room. He was going out to the stalls, he said, to get something from the saddlebags. At first he could not find the journeyman tanner, he had to ask a groom to give him a lantern. Then he saw him, lying on some straw and an old blanket in one corner, his head resting on his knapsack, sound asleep. He looked so totally insignificant that for a moment Richis had the impression that he was not even there, but was merely a chimera cast by the swaying shadow of the lantern candle. At any rate, Richis was immediately convinced that there was no danger whatever to fear from this almost touchingly harmless creature, and he left very quietly so as not to disturb his sleep and went back into the inn.
He took his evening meal in his own room along with his daughter. He had not explained the purpose and goal of their journey to her and did not do it even now, although she asked him. Tomorrow he would let her in on the secret, he said, but she could be certain that everything that he was planning and doing was for her good and would work toward her future happiness.
After their meal they played a few games of I’hombre, which he lost because he was forever gazing at her face to delight in her beauty instead of looking at his cards. Around nine o’clock he brought her to her room, directly across from his own, kissed her good night, and locked the door from the outside. Then he went to bed himself.
He was suddenly very tired from the exertions of the day and of the night before and equally very satisfied with himself and how things had gone. Without the least thought of care, without any of the gloomy suspicions that until yesterday had plagued him and kept him awake every time he had put out his light, he instantly fell asleep and slept without a dream, without a moan, without a twitch or a nervous toss of his body back and forth. For the first time in a good while, Richis found deep, peaceful, refreshing sleep.
Around the same time, Grenouille got up from his bed in the stall. He too was satisfied with how things were going and felt completely refreshed, although he had not slept a single second. When Richis had come to the stall looking for him, he had only feigned sleep, augmenting the impression of obvious harmlessness he already exuded with his odor of inconspicuous-ness. Moreover, in contrast to the way in which Richis had perceived him, he had observed Richis with utmost accuracy, olfactory accuracy, and Richis’s relief at the sight of him had definitely not escaped him.
And so at their meeting each had convinced himself of the other’s harmlessness, both correctly and falsely, and that was how it should be, Grenouille thought, for his apparent and Richis’s true harmlessness made it much easier for him, Grenouille, to go about his work-an opinion that, to be sure, Richis would definitely have shared had the situation been reversed.
He knew that any attempt to break into the well-protected mansion on the rue Droite was pointless. Which was why he planned, just as dusk fell and before the doors were closed, to sneak in under his cover of odorlessness, which like a magic cape deprived man and beast of their perceptive faculties, and there to hide in some nook of the house. Then later, when everyone was asleep, he would follow the compass of his nose through the darkness and climb up to the chamber that held his treasure. He would set to work on it with his oil-drenched cloths right then and there. All that he would take with him would be, as usual, the hair and clothes, since these could be washed directly in rectified spirit, which could be done more conveniently in the workshop. He estimated it would take an additional night to complete the production of the pomade and to distill the concentrate. And if everything went well-and he had no reason to doubt that everything would go well— then by the day after tomorrow he would possess all of the essences needed for the best perfume in the world, and he would leave Grasse as the world’s most fragrant human being.
Around noon he was finished with his jonquils. He doused the fire, covered the pot of oil, and stepped outside the workshop to cool off. The wind was from the west.
With his very first breath, he knew something was wrong. The atmosphere was not as it should be. In the town’s aromatic garb, that veil of many thousands of woven threads, the golden thread was missing. During the last few weeks the fragrance of that thread had grown so strong that Grenouilie had clearly discerned it from his cabin on the far side of the town. Now it was gone, vanished, untraceable despite the most intensive sniffing. Grenouilie was almost paralyzed with fright.
She is dead, he thought. Then, more terrifying still: Someone else has got to her before me. Someone else has plucked my flower and taken its odor for himself! He could not so much as scream, the shock was too great for that, but he could produce tears that welled up in the corners of his eyes and suddenly streamed down both sides of his nose.
Then Druot, returning home from the Quatre Dauphins for lunch, remarked in passing that early this morning the second consul had left for Grenoble together with twelve mules and his daughter. Gre-nouille forced back the tears and ran off, straight through town to the Porte du Cours. He stopped to sniff in the square before the gate. And in the pure west wind, unsullied by the odors of the town, he did indeed find his golden thread again, thin and fragile, but absolutely unmistakable. The precious scent, however, was not blowing from the northwest, where the road leads toward Grenoble, but more from the direction of Cabris-if not directly out of the southwest.
Grenouille asked the watch which road the second consul had taken. The guard pointed north. Not the road to Cabris? Or the other one, that went south toward Auribeau and La Napoule? Definitely not, said the guard, he had watched with his own eyes.
Grenouille ran back through town to his cabin, packed linen, pomade pot, spatula, scissors, and a small, smooth club of olivewood into his knapsack and promptly took to the road-not the road to Grenoble, but the one to which his nose directed him: to the south.
This road, the direct road to La Napoule, led along the foothills of the Tanneron, through the river valleys of the Frayere and Siagne. It was an easy walk. Grenouille made rapid progress. As Auribeau emerged on his right, clinging to the mountains above him, he could smell that he had almost caught up with the runaways. A little later and he had drawn even with them. He could now smell each one, could smell the aroma of their horses. At most they were no more than a half mile west of him, somewhere in the forests of the Tanneron. They were holding course southwards, toward the sea. Just as he was.
Around five o’clock that evening, Grenouille reached La Napoule. He went to the inn, ate, and asked for cheap lodging. He was a journeyman tanner from Nice, he said, on his way to Marseille. He could spend the night in a stall, they told him. There he lay down in a corner and rested. He could smell the three riders approaching. He need only wait.
Two hours later-it was deep dusk by then-they arrived. To preserve their disguise, they had changed costumes. The two women now wore dark cloaks and veils, Richis a black frock coat. He identified himself as a nobleman on his way from Castellane; in the morning he wanted to be ferried over to the lies de LSrins, the innkeeper should make arrangements for a boat to be ready by sunrise. Were there any other guests in the house besides himself and his people? No, said the innkeeper, only a journeyman tanner from Nice who was spending the night in a stall.
Richis sent the women to their room. He was going out to the stalls, he said, to get something from the saddlebags. At first he could not find the journeyman tanner, he had to ask a groom to give him a lantern. Then he saw him, lying on some straw and an old blanket in one corner, his head resting on his knapsack, sound asleep. He looked so totally insignificant that for a moment Richis had the impression that he was not even there, but was merely a chimera cast by the swaying shadow of the lantern candle. At any rate, Richis was immediately convinced that there was no danger whatever to fear from this almost touchingly harmless creature, and he left very quietly so as not to disturb his sleep and went back into the inn.
He took his evening meal in his own room along with his daughter. He had not explained the purpose and goal of their journey to her and did not do it even now, although she asked him. Tomorrow he would let her in on the secret, he said, but she could be certain that everything that he was planning and doing was for her good and would work toward her future happiness.
After their meal they played a few games of I’hombre, which he lost because he was forever gazing at her face to delight in her beauty instead of looking at his cards. Around nine o’clock he brought her to her room, directly across from his own, kissed her good night, and locked the door from the outside. Then he went to bed himself.
He was suddenly very tired from the exertions of the day and of the night before and equally very satisfied with himself and how things had gone. Without the least thought of care, without any of the gloomy suspicions that until yesterday had plagued him and kept him awake every time he had put out his light, he instantly fell asleep and slept without a dream, without a moan, without a twitch or a nervous toss of his body back and forth. For the first time in a good while, Richis found deep, peaceful, refreshing sleep.
Around the same time, Grenouille got up from his bed in the stall. He too was satisfied with how things were going and felt completely refreshed, although he had not slept a single second. When Richis had come to the stall looking for him, he had only feigned sleep, augmenting the impression of obvious harmlessness he already exuded with his odor of inconspicuous-ness. Moreover, in contrast to the way in which Richis had perceived him, he had observed Richis with utmost accuracy, olfactory accuracy, and Richis’s relief at the sight of him had definitely not escaped him.
And so at their meeting each had convinced himself of the other’s harmlessness, both correctly and falsely, and that was how it should be, Grenouille thought, for his apparent and Richis’s true harmlessness made it much easier for him, Grenouille, to go about his work-an opinion that, to be sure, Richis would definitely have shared had the situation been reversed.
Forty-five
GRENOUILLE SET to work with professional circumspection. He opened his knapsack, took out the linen, pomade, and spatula, spread the cloth over the blanket on which he had lain, and began to brush on the fatty paste. This job took time, for it was important that the oil be applied in thinner or thicker layers depending on what part of the body would end up lying on a particular patch of the cloth. The mouth and armpits, breasts, genitals, and feet gave off greater amounts of scent than, for instance, shins, back, and elbows; the palms more than the backs of the hands; eyebrows more than eyelids, etc.-and therefore needed to be provided with a heavier dose of oil. Grenouille was creating a model, as it were, transferring onto the linen a scent diagram of the body to be treated, and this part of the job was actually the one that satisfied him most, for it was a matter of an artistic technique that incorporated equally one’s knowledge, imagination, and manual dexterity, while at the same time it anticipated on an ideal plane the enjoyment awaiting one from the final results. Once he had applied the whole potful of pomade, he dabbed about here and there, removing a bit of oil from the cloth here, adding another there, retouching, checking the greasy landscape he had modeled one last time-with his nose, by the way, not with his eyes, for the whole business was carried on in total darkness, which was perhaps yet another reason for Grenouille’s equably cheerful mood. There was nothing to distract him on this night of new moon. The world was nothing but odor and the soft sound of surf from the sea. He was in his element. Then he folded the cloth together like a tapestry, so that the oiled surfaces lay against one another. This was a painful procedure for him, because he knew well that despite the utmost caution certain parts of the sculpted contours would be flattened or shifted. But there was no other way to transport the cloth. After he had folded it up small enough to be carried under his arm without all too much difficulty, he tucked spatula, scissors, and the little olivewood club in his pockets and crept out into the night.
The sky was clouded over. There were no lights burning in the inn. The only glimmer on this pitch-dark night was the winking of the lighthouse at the fort on the He Sainte-Marguerite, over a mile away to the east, a tiny bright needlepoint in a raven-black cloth. A light, fishy wind was blowing from the bay. The dogs were asleep.
Grenouille walked to the back dormer of the threshing shed, where a ladder stood propped. He picked the ladder up, and balancing it vertically, three rungs clamped under his free right arm, the rest of it pressed against his right shoulder, he moved across the courtyard until he was under her window. The window stood half ajar. As he climbed the ladder, as easily as a set of stairs, he congratulated himself on the circumstances that made it possible for him to harvest the girl’s scent here in La Napoule. In Grasse, where the house had barred windows and was tightly guarded, all this would have been much more difficult. She was even sleeping by herself here. He would not have to bother with eliminating the maid.
He pushed up the casement, slipped into the room, and laid down his cloth. Then he turned to the bed. The dominant scent came from her hair, for she was lying on her stomach with her head pressed into the pillow and framed by the crook of her arm— presenting the back of her head in an almost ideal position for the blow by the club.
The sound of the blow was a dull, grinding thud. He hated it. He hated it solely because it was a sound, a sound in the midst of his otherwise soundless procedure. He could bear that gruesome sound only by clenching his teeth, and, after it was all over, standing off to one side stiff and implacable, as if he feared the sound would return from somewhere as a resounding echo. But it did not return, instead stillness returned to the room, an increased stillness in fact, for now even the shuffle of the girl’s breathing had ceased. And at once Grenouille’s tenseness dissolved (one might have interpreted it more as a posture of reverence or some sort of crabbed moment of silence) and his body fell back to a pliable ease.
He tucked the club away and from here on was all bustle and business. First he unfolded the impregnating cloth, spread it loosely on its back over the table and chairs, taking care that the greased side not be touched. Then he pulled back the bedclothes. The glorious scent of the girl, welling up so suddenly warm and massive, did not stir him. He knew that scent, of course, and would savor it, savor it to intoxication, later on, once he truly possessed it. But now the main thing was to capture as much of it as possible, let as little of it as possible evaporate; for now the watchwords were concentration and haste.
With a few quick snips of his scissors, he cut open her nightgown, pulled it off, grabbed the oiled linen, and tossed it over her naked body. Then he lifted her up, tugged the overhanging cloth under her, rolled her up in it as a baker rolls strudel, tucking in the corners, enveloping her from toes up to brow. Only her hair still stuck out from the mummy clothes. He cut it off close to her scalp and packed it inside her nightgown, which he then tied up into a bundle. Finally he took a piece of cloth still dangling free and flapped it over the shaved skull, smoothed down the overlapping ends, gently pressed it tight with a finger. He examined the whole package. Not a slit, not a hole, not one bulging pleat was left through which the girl’s scent could have escaped. She was perfectly packed. There was nothing to do but wait, for six hours, until the gray of dawn.
He took the little armchair on which her clothes lay, dragged it to the bed, and sat down. The gentle breath of her scent still clung to the ample black cloak, blending with the odor of aniseed cakes she had put in her pocket as a snack for the journey. He put his feet up on the end of the bed, near her feet, covered himself with her dress, and ate aniseed cakes. He was tired. But he did not want to fall asleep, because it was improper to sleep on the job, even if your job was merely to wait. He recalled the nights he had spent distilling in Baldini’s workshop: the soot-blackened alembic, the flickering fire, the soft spitting sound the distillate made as it dripped from the cooling tube into the Florentine flask. From time to time you had to tend the fire, pour in more distilling water, change Florentine flasks, replace the exhausted stuff you were distilling. And yet it had always seemed to him that you stayed awake not so that you could take care of these occasional tasks, but because being awake had its own unique purpose. Even here in this bedchamber, where the process of enfleurage was proceeding all on its own, where in fact premature checking, turning, or poking the fragrant package could only cause trouble-even here, it seemed to Grenouille, his waking presence was important. Sleep would have endangered the spirit of success.
It was not especially difficult for him to stay awake and wait, despite his weariness. He loved this waiting. He had also loved it with the twenty-four other girls, for it was aot a dull waiting-till-it’s-over, not even a yearning, expectant waiting, but an attendant, purposeful, in a certain sense active, waiting. Something was happening while you waited. The most essential thing was happening. And even if he himself was doing nothing, it was happening through him nevertheless. He had done his best. He had employed all his artistic skill. He had made not one single mistake. His performance had been unique. It would be crowned with success… He need only wait a few more hours. It filled him with profound satisfaction, this waiting. He had never felt so fine in all his life, so peaceful, so steady, so whole and at one with himself-not even back inside his mountain-as during these hours when a craftsman took his rest sitting in the dark of night beside his victim, waiting and watching. They were the only moments when something like cheerful thoughts formed inside his gloomy brain.
The sky was clouded over. There were no lights burning in the inn. The only glimmer on this pitch-dark night was the winking of the lighthouse at the fort on the He Sainte-Marguerite, over a mile away to the east, a tiny bright needlepoint in a raven-black cloth. A light, fishy wind was blowing from the bay. The dogs were asleep.
Grenouille walked to the back dormer of the threshing shed, where a ladder stood propped. He picked the ladder up, and balancing it vertically, three rungs clamped under his free right arm, the rest of it pressed against his right shoulder, he moved across the courtyard until he was under her window. The window stood half ajar. As he climbed the ladder, as easily as a set of stairs, he congratulated himself on the circumstances that made it possible for him to harvest the girl’s scent here in La Napoule. In Grasse, where the house had barred windows and was tightly guarded, all this would have been much more difficult. She was even sleeping by herself here. He would not have to bother with eliminating the maid.
He pushed up the casement, slipped into the room, and laid down his cloth. Then he turned to the bed. The dominant scent came from her hair, for she was lying on her stomach with her head pressed into the pillow and framed by the crook of her arm— presenting the back of her head in an almost ideal position for the blow by the club.
The sound of the blow was a dull, grinding thud. He hated it. He hated it solely because it was a sound, a sound in the midst of his otherwise soundless procedure. He could bear that gruesome sound only by clenching his teeth, and, after it was all over, standing off to one side stiff and implacable, as if he feared the sound would return from somewhere as a resounding echo. But it did not return, instead stillness returned to the room, an increased stillness in fact, for now even the shuffle of the girl’s breathing had ceased. And at once Grenouille’s tenseness dissolved (one might have interpreted it more as a posture of reverence or some sort of crabbed moment of silence) and his body fell back to a pliable ease.
He tucked the club away and from here on was all bustle and business. First he unfolded the impregnating cloth, spread it loosely on its back over the table and chairs, taking care that the greased side not be touched. Then he pulled back the bedclothes. The glorious scent of the girl, welling up so suddenly warm and massive, did not stir him. He knew that scent, of course, and would savor it, savor it to intoxication, later on, once he truly possessed it. But now the main thing was to capture as much of it as possible, let as little of it as possible evaporate; for now the watchwords were concentration and haste.
With a few quick snips of his scissors, he cut open her nightgown, pulled it off, grabbed the oiled linen, and tossed it over her naked body. Then he lifted her up, tugged the overhanging cloth under her, rolled her up in it as a baker rolls strudel, tucking in the corners, enveloping her from toes up to brow. Only her hair still stuck out from the mummy clothes. He cut it off close to her scalp and packed it inside her nightgown, which he then tied up into a bundle. Finally he took a piece of cloth still dangling free and flapped it over the shaved skull, smoothed down the overlapping ends, gently pressed it tight with a finger. He examined the whole package. Not a slit, not a hole, not one bulging pleat was left through which the girl’s scent could have escaped. She was perfectly packed. There was nothing to do but wait, for six hours, until the gray of dawn.
He took the little armchair on which her clothes lay, dragged it to the bed, and sat down. The gentle breath of her scent still clung to the ample black cloak, blending with the odor of aniseed cakes she had put in her pocket as a snack for the journey. He put his feet up on the end of the bed, near her feet, covered himself with her dress, and ate aniseed cakes. He was tired. But he did not want to fall asleep, because it was improper to sleep on the job, even if your job was merely to wait. He recalled the nights he had spent distilling in Baldini’s workshop: the soot-blackened alembic, the flickering fire, the soft spitting sound the distillate made as it dripped from the cooling tube into the Florentine flask. From time to time you had to tend the fire, pour in more distilling water, change Florentine flasks, replace the exhausted stuff you were distilling. And yet it had always seemed to him that you stayed awake not so that you could take care of these occasional tasks, but because being awake had its own unique purpose. Even here in this bedchamber, where the process of enfleurage was proceeding all on its own, where in fact premature checking, turning, or poking the fragrant package could only cause trouble-even here, it seemed to Grenouille, his waking presence was important. Sleep would have endangered the spirit of success.
It was not especially difficult for him to stay awake and wait, despite his weariness. He loved this waiting. He had also loved it with the twenty-four other girls, for it was aot a dull waiting-till-it’s-over, not even a yearning, expectant waiting, but an attendant, purposeful, in a certain sense active, waiting. Something was happening while you waited. The most essential thing was happening. And even if he himself was doing nothing, it was happening through him nevertheless. He had done his best. He had employed all his artistic skill. He had made not one single mistake. His performance had been unique. It would be crowned with success… He need only wait a few more hours. It filled him with profound satisfaction, this waiting. He had never felt so fine in all his life, so peaceful, so steady, so whole and at one with himself-not even back inside his mountain-as during these hours when a craftsman took his rest sitting in the dark of night beside his victim, waiting and watching. They were the only moments when something like cheerful thoughts formed inside his gloomy brain.