The Perfume Collector(54)

‘How extraordinary. But how were these ingredients discovered?’

‘God only knows! Perhaps one of the most instinctive things to do when you encounter something new is to pick it up and smell it. Though I don’t like to dwell on the discovery of the civet cat too long. You see, most people assume perfume is made only from crushed flower petals but nothing could be further from the truth. All these ingredients give weight, dimension and contrast. Without them, the result is shallow and one-dimensional. But,’ he held up the card again, ‘hair has a very subtle, elusive, earthy quality. Extremely difficult to capture.’

Grace looked at him closely. ‘Have you ever tried to capture it?’

‘Oh, yes. Many times,’ he admitted, a little self-consciously. ‘It’s one of the first things you notice, that you smell, during an embrace. The warmth of your lover’s hair.’

She felt her cheeks colour a little and looked away. ‘I hadn’t thought of it like that.’

He reread the card. ‘It appeared to be a specific request. The same with the lambswool.’ He paused. ‘As though someone was creating accords of an experience. Or a memory.’

Grace had never heard of such a thing. ‘Is that possible?’

‘Oh, yes.’ His face was quite serious. ‘Though not very common. It’s something of a connoisseur’s obsession.’ Lowering his voice, he indicated the beautifully dressed women who strolled in a leisurely manner from one counter to another around them, like rare, exquisite creatures, meant only for show. ‘Most customers want to smell like those they aspire to become, not who they were in the past. But perfumers are always attempting to capture scents that remind us of certain places, people, moments. It’s the great challenge, to capture not only a true scent but one that recalls entire experience.’

‘Can that even be done?’ It sounded more like alchemy than perfume.

‘Occasionally. Here,’ he gestured for her to follow him, ‘let me show you something.’

He led her behind the glass counter and into a private storeroom behind the main shop. Taking out a set of keys from his pocket, he unlocked a narrow door into a dark, cool room where he selected a bottle.

‘Close your eyes,’ he instructed, taking the lid off. Then he dabbed a drop of it on to her wrist.

Grace shut her eyes and inhaled.

Suddenly, she wasn’t indoors any more or even in Paris. But outside her parents’ home in rural Oxfordshire, on the low sloping hill facing the house. It was late afternoon, the sky heavy with thick white-grey clouds; the lights in the house windows glowing brightly, like flame. The air tasted of ice.

She opened her eyes, stared at him, her mind reaching to grasp at a certain feeling . . . a specific time and place. ‘I know that smell! But how do I know it?’

He grinned, delighted. ‘Snow.’

‘Snow! Of course.’ She pressed her wrist to her nose. ‘But how can you do that?’

‘It’s one of my own,’ he said proudly. ‘It’s taken me years to perfect it. You see, nothing is more immediate, more complete than the sense of smell. In an instant, it has the power to transport you. Your olfactory sense connects not to the memory itself, but to the emotion you felt when that memory was made. To recreate a scent memory is one of the most challenging, eloquent pursuits possible. It’s poetry, in its most immediate form.’

Grace looked at him with wonder. ‘I was a child, on the hill outside my parents’ house.’

He nodded. ‘Scent memory is incredibly personal, a very private experience. My own memory couldn’t be more different. Hungry, running across a frozen field. Dawn breaking.’ His expression shifted, he seemed to recede before her, slipping into another place. ‘Then the snow.’

Monsieur Androski replaced the lid.

Grace caught sight of the label: La Pologne, 1942.

Poland.

The winter after the invasion.

She watched as he replaced the bottle in the storeroom and locked the door.

They walked back out into the boutique, golden with light, soft-spoken sales assistants, the air thick with the hypnotic floral blends that Guerlain had become famous for.

He handed the card back to her. ‘Whatever she was working on, it was not meant to be an ordinary commercial perfume.’

‘She?’ Grace asked. ‘What makes you say “she”?’

He pointed to the signature at the bottom. ‘“M. Zed”. It can only be Madame Zed. Do you know who she was?’

‘I’m sorry. No.’

‘She was a very well-known perfumer in the early 1900s. Russian, I believe. There was a rumour that she was some sort of escaped aristocracy from the Russian Revolution. She became the house nose for Lanvin and created maybe fourteen or fifteen perfumes for them. And then suddenly, at the height of her success, she disappeared. Of course her most distinctive creation is world famous – Mon Péché.’