The Perfume Collector

New York, 1927

The woman in room 512 was Russian and known by the name of Madame Zed. She was what the French would describe as jolie laide; with an oval, rather long face and dark, heavy-lidded eyes. Her mouth was small, with a tendency to smile on only one side, when she smiled at all. But mostly she sat and drank, smoking long black cigarettes and talking in either Russian or French to a small coterie of devoted followers who came to visit her at the Hotel each day. Sis said many of them were Russian aristocracy, displaced by the Revolution. They travelled from country to country, hotel to hotel, searching for anyone who remembered who they used to be.

An inner gravity dominated Madame Zed. Her voice was low and resonant, pulling in those around her like an undertow. Her figure was very tall, rail straight and angular but she had a way of moving which was fluid and eminently watchable, and she knew how to dress simply so that these movements were emphasized. There was in her, for all her physical failings, an ambiguous, otherworldly sensuality. When her black eyes took you in, her capacity to stare unblinking, without any emotion, was both shocking and mesmerizing.

She’d come directly from Paris and shared a suite of rooms with her assistant, a young man named Valmont. Slightly built, he had brooding features and large, serious brown eyes. He stood in her shadow, listening, nodding in agreement, laughing in appreciation of her wit, managing her appointments, overseeing her preferences. The door was always left open between their rooms in case she wanted something.

One of his many duties was to ensure that the curtains of her room were drawn at all times and the rotary fan turned on high. Madame Zed was incredibly sensitive to smells. Almost everything offended her refined sensibility. This meant she was also incredibly picky about what sorts of cleaning supplies were used. Before Eva could start, Valmont would smell them, his upper lip curling in a pantomime performance of revulsion. ‘For you, it is nothing. But for her, it’s crucial. She has to spend all night with these foul odours!’

Eva had never heard of anything so ridiculous. ‘Bleach is the only way to remove a soap ring completely from the bath. Wouldn’t she rather know that the room was really clean? The smell of the bleach lets you know that it’s clean.’

He looked at her as if she were something foul, stuck to the bottom of his shoe. ‘When I need your advice, I’ll ask. And don’t speak to me with that tone again.’

Eva turned away. She hated being ordered about by a boy only a few years older than herself. ‘Je peux dire ce que je veux,’ she grumbled, head down.

‘What did you say?’

‘I said, no one else in the hotel complains.’

‘No one else in the hotel is a master perfumer! And I don’t know who taught you to parler français but you have the accent of a peasant.’

He had nerve.

‘I am French!’ she retorted. ‘My family is from the South.’

‘Of what? New Jersey? You cannot come in here with that revolting-smelling liquid.’

‘Then what do you suggest?’

Valmont folded his arms across his chest. ‘What do you suggest, sir?’

Eva gritted her teeth. ‘What do you suggest, sir?’

‘I suggest that you solve the problem.’

‘Trade with me,’ Eva begged Sis that night in bed. ‘I’ll do anything for you if you just take over that one room for me.’

‘Are you crazy?’ Sis snorted. ‘I have enough trouble on my floor as it is. I’ve got some batty old duchess who keeps wanting me to tuck her into bed each night. Must be ninety-three if she’s a day. Calls me Nanny and asks me to sing her to sleep. Do I look like a nanny?’

‘I’ll take her. Please, Sis!’

‘No. And don’t ask again. Face it, you can’t give that one away, honey. You’re just going to have to make do until they check out. Everyone’s got at least a few a year. And I’ll tell you something for nothing, it could be worse.’ She rolled over onto her side, her back to Eva. ‘It could always be much worse.’

Eva was so desperate she even searched out her uncle in the kitchens for advice. It was between services and most of the staff were eating an early supper; the kitchens were empty with the exception of one of the pastry chefs, who was crushing lemon halves, squeezing out the juice, for tarte au citron. The entire kitchen was filled with the bright, refreshing aroma of lemons.

Eva watched as he tossed the used halves into a bucket at his feet.

‘Pardon me,’ she asked after a while, pointing to the lemon rinds, ‘are you using those?’

He looked up, surprised. ‘I’m sorry?’

She looked around the kitchen. ‘What do you think goes with lemon juice?’

‘Lemon juice? Sugar,’ he laughed. ‘Lots of it!’

‘No, not to eat.’ She picked up a bunch of fresh mint from a crate of produce, held it to her nose. ‘To smell.’

In the end, she concocted a solution of lemon juice, a few judicious drops of pressed rosemary oil and large quantities of baking soda mixed into a thick, abrasive paste. When she returned later that afternoon to scrub the bathroom, even she had to admit that the bracing, herbal aroma imparted an invigorating satisfaction to her efforts.

‘Not bad.’

Eva turned around to see Valmont standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame with his hands in his pockets. ‘Though a little lavender would have been a nice touch.’

She got up from her hands and knees. ‘You’re wrong.’

His eyes narrowed. ‘I’m sorry, what did you say?’

She held her ground. ‘Lavender wouldn’t be an improvement.’

‘You’re arguing with me?’ He laughed, incredulously. ‘What qualifies you to correct me?’

She picked up her bucket. ‘Nothing. I’m just right.’

‘I’ll have you know that Madame Zed is a world renowned perfumer and I am her only apprentice!’

Eva took a deep breath. ‘Yes, but we all have noses.’

Suddenly they were interrupted by a deep, throaty laugh.

‘Bravo!’ Madame Zed walked forward from the half-light of the bedroom behind them, clapping her hands. ‘This little maid has seen through you, Valmont! She knows your downfall – you always add another note, complicate things. She’s right, you see. Simple is cleaner, more elegant.’

Valmont scowled at his feet. ‘Yes, madame,’ he muttered.

‘There is nothing more difficult than simplicity,’ Madame added, turning her back on them. ‘And therefore, nothing more refined.’

Valmont ceased to harangue Eva after that and the next morning, Eva noticed that Madame had placed a small white rose in a water glass near the sink.

She took it as a sign of approval.

As time went on, Eva grew to respect and even admire the eccentricities of Madame Zed. For example, rather than adapt to her surroundings, she transformed them. Madame Zed’s rooms were layered in personal history, as if its occupants had lived there for years rather than weeks; she created a mysterious and exotic atmosphere out of a few select additions. Embroidered silk shawls were thrown across armchairs, brocade and velvet cushions tossed in soft, inviting piles on the floor, like an oriental harem. White orchids with waxy petals gave off a hypnotic scent and collections of pastel, sugary French confections were dotted about the room on silver dishes. Steamer trunks, papered with tags from all over the world, were lined up against the far wall, bursting with long flowing gowns in rich colours and strangely asymmetrical tunics. The thick curtains let in only the dimmest fraction of light so that even during the day, her quarters had a smoky decadence about them, like a world suspended in a permanent night.

Eva had almost finished in Madame Zed’s room one afternoon, when she noticed a circular black flacon with a gold stopper on her dressing table. It had a solid, pleasing roundness that made her want to pick it up, feel the weight of it in her hands.

Eva knew it was wrong to disturb a guest’s belongings but the black bottle was too intriguing.

She lifted it up.

My Sin, the label read, in gold lettering.

Very carefully she opened it, holding the gold stopper to her nose. Up wafted the intense floral top notes of narcissus and freesia, warming to a dark, almost animal muskiness. It was intoxicatingly beautiful and, at the same time, dangerous, with jarring hidden depths.

It was a smell she recognized, aspired to; the hypnotic veil of sensuality that clung to the skin, the clothes, even permeated the sheets of every chorus girl, socialite and movie star that graced the lobby of the Hotel.

Closing her eyes, she inhaled again.

‘I suppose that means you like it.’ Standing in the doorway was Madame Zed, wrapped in a dark lace shawl, her face half hidden in shadow. She was smoking a cigarette, in a long mother-of-pearl holder.

Eva put the bottle down. ‘I apologize, madam. I’m so sorry.’

‘Careful! That’s the only one I have. Otherwise, I shall have to buy it. Can you imagine, buying your own creation?’ And she chuckled a little, crossing the room to put the stopper back on.

‘I’m terribly sorry.’

Madame Zed gave only the ghost of a shrug. ‘It’s no matter. I myself cannot resist smelling other people’s perfumes. In five minutes, I can dissect their entire palate. But this,’ she pointed to the black bottle, ‘this you like?’

Eva felt her face grow hot with embarrassment. ‘I’ve never smelled anything like it. It’s so… so,’ she struggled to find the words, ‘so full of different things.’

Madame Zed inhaled, looking at her closely through those heavily lidded black eyes. ‘Complex,’ she said at last. ‘It’s a complex perfume.’

‘Yes. One minute it’s pretty and floral and the next, it’s full of spice and heat and… I don’t know how to put it…’

‘Sex.’ Madame interjected. ‘It was always about sex, right from the start.’

‘Oh.’ Eva’s eyes widened.

‘Why not? Everyone wants it.’ Madame Zed settled into an armchair. ‘I suppose that’s why it’s so popular. Of course, I had to make it stronger than I would’ve liked.’

‘You made it?’

She nodded. ‘That is my profession. I am a “nose”, as they say. I’ve been mixing perfumes since I was your age. Though now, I’ve finished.’

‘But why?’

‘To be honest,’ she flicked a bit of ash off her long cigarette, ‘I cannot bear that everyone smells alike. It’s vulgar. And that,’ she nodded to the bottle of My Sin on the dressing table, ‘already all of Paris smells like it and most of New York. There is something wrong, deeply wrong, about an entire room of women who all smell the same.’

‘But to be able to create something like this is like… like being an artist or a magician!’

Madame Zed laughed. ‘You’re very young.’

‘I wouldn’t mind smelling like that.’

‘Oh now, really!’ Madame protested. ‘Think of a man, dancing with a beautiful young girl, in a crowded ballroom. He presses his nose into her soft hair and inhales. Then, two minutes later, he’s dancing with another girl who smells exactly the same. What’s the point? Perfume should tell a story – the story of who you are, who you might be, perhaps even of who you fear becoming… all of these things are possible. It’s a very intimate element of a woman, just like her signature or the sound of her voice. And it conveys feelings and states of being that have no name, no language. Its very ambiguity makes it truer than words because, unlike words, it can’t be manipulated or misunderstood. You see, it’s not the perfume itself that isn’t worthy – it’s an original, one of the finest of the decade. But I’m tired of making off-the-peg dreams. I want a challenge worthy of my art.’

‘The name, madam…’ Eva could hardly say it out loud without blushing.

‘My Sin.’ Madame Zed said the words slowly, her black eyes unblinking. ‘What about it?’

Eva hesitated. ‘It’s just… well… what does it mean? What sin?’

Madame was silent for a moment, looking past Eva, or rather through her, as if she were transparent. Finally she spoke. ‘Do you know what sin means?’

‘To do something wrong?’

Madame shook her head. ‘That’s one meaning. But there’s another, from the Greek, hamartia, which translates, “to miss the mark”. That’s the meaning I prefer.’

‘To miss the mark,’ Eva repeated, committing it to memory.

‘Yes,’ Madame continued. ‘We try and fail, like archers who aim for the target but fall short of the mark.’ Eva watched as she removed the lace shawl. ‘When you are older and have swum out into the stream of life, you’ll see – there are no “good” people, little girl. We’re all trying and failing, trying too hard and failing too often. Remember that. We shouldn’t judge too harshly, in the end, the sins of others.’

‘No, madam. Of course not.’

Eva wasn’t sure she’d answered her question.

But the older woman sank down into the armchair, stretching her legs out on the ottoman. She took another drag of her cigarette. Her voice softened to almost a whisper. ‘Sometimes I think the only things we have in common with one another are our shortcomings’

Eva stood enthralled.

Exhaling a long stream of smoke, Madame closed her eyes and her head lolled to one side.

Eva waited for her to continue.

Madame’s hand relaxed.

The cigarette fell to the floor.

Eva rushed to put it out before it burned a hole in the carpet.

Then Madame began to snore, so loudly that Valmont came in.

‘Oh. It’s you,’ he said, jamming his hands sullenly into his pockets. ‘I should’ve known.’

Eva planted her hands on her hips. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

He ignored her question. ‘Jesus! She’s been to Chinatown again. Help me get her on to the bed,’ he ordered, lifting Madame up under her arms.

Begrudgingly, Eva grabbed her legs. ‘Goodness!’ she gasped. ‘She weighs a lot for someone so skinny!’

Together they hauled her onto the bed. Madame didn’t even so much as miss a beat in her snoring and rolled over heavily on to her side.

‘I’ve never heard anyone so loud.’

‘It is a bit much,’ Valmont admitted. ‘It goes right through the door at night. I sleep with about four pillows on my head. She’ll be passed out for the rest of the day now.’

‘She doesn’t smell drunk.’

He rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t you know anything? Opium,’ he explained. ‘She’s been smoking opium.’

‘Oh.’ Eva stared in awe at the sleeping woman. An opium den. How dreadful, low and exciting.

‘We’re going to Morocco soon and it will only get worse.’

‘Morocco? What are you going to do there?’

‘We’re buying ingredients. They have, among other things, one of the finest jasmine harvests in all the world. Normally we buy them through a third party but I’m sure if we go there ourselves we’ll discover not only purer absolutes for a better price, but I have a feeling we’ll also stumble across some rare indigenous ingredients we haven’t encountered yet in Europe. And that’s what we’re looking for – a new palette, something truly original.’

Eva smiled to herself, gathering her duster from the dressing table.

‘Why are you sneering at me?’ he demanded.

‘I’m not sneering.’

‘Yes, you are.’

‘You always talk like you’re in charge,’ she pointed out.

‘Well, I do have influence. She values my opinion. She’s one of the world’s greatest perfumers and I am, after all, her only apprentice.’

‘So you keep saying – over and over again. Besides, I thought you were her secretary.’

‘I’m more than that. You see,’ he followed her into the bathroom, leaned against the doorway, ‘you can’t go to school to learn the art of the perfumer. You have to possess a natural, God-given talent and then the secrets of the profession must be passed on by a master. I have been an apprentice to Madame since I was nine.’

‘Nine? How old are you now?’

‘Eighteen.’

She snorted. ‘Are you a slow learner?’

‘It’s an art!’ He glared at her. ‘It takes years just to memorize the various ingredients. It isn’t just about mixing notes together but about developing a palette, a comprehension of scent and how it works. Do you have any idea of how difficult it is to create a fragrance that develops properly on the human skin and lasts?’

Eva folded her arms defensively across her chest. ‘So how did Madame know you had talent in the first place?’

‘I suppose she could just tell.’ This girl really asked the most presumptuous questions. ‘Actually, even when I was small I could dissect smells, take them apart and decipher their precise ingredients. There is a story that Madame discovered me one day standing in the neighbour’s garden, standing over a rosemary bush. Apparently I was so lost in concentration, I couldn’t hear my name being called. It was by far the nicest-smelling thing in the whole village,’ he recalled.

‘And your parents just gave you to her?’

‘No! Of course not!’ he snapped.

‘I’m only asking!’ she snapped back. ‘Did they pay her?’

‘They don’t have that kind of money. My parents came from Prussia. They’d escaped, during the Revolution, with nothing but what they could carry. My father was a cantor.’

‘A what?’

‘A cantor,’ he repeated, his cheeks colouring a little. ‘It’s a singer of religious songs in the Jewish temple.’

‘Oh.’ She’d never actually spoken to anyone Jewish.

‘It’s a sacred profession – a vocation really – that’s been passed down through generations,’ he continued. ‘I suppose they thought I might follow my father one day. But my parents couldn’t afford to keep all of us – my brothers and sisters are younger than me. And cantors don’t make much money. For a while I lived with some neighbours down the street. I suppose they were nice enough. Tailors. I used to press the garments, deliver orders and clean the work room to earn my keep.’

‘How old were you?’

‘I’m not sure… six or seven. And then Madame came along, looking for an assistant – someone she could train. Her offer was a rare opportunity.’

‘Still, it’s quite young.’ Eva’s voice softened. ‘Did you ever seen them again – your parents?’

He shook his head. ‘You must miss them.’

‘Oh, I don’t know. I never really think about it.’

Eva wasn’t fooled. ‘My mother died when I was born, back in Lille,’ she said. ‘My aunt and uncle brought me here. But they didn’t really want me. It’s funny, isn’t it? How you can miss someone you’ve never known.’

‘I suppose.’

Eva adjusted the tin bucket and mop on the side of her cart. ‘I sometimes wonder what it would’ve been like if my mother had lived. If she would’ve cared for me at all.’

Her words touched him.

He also wondered if his parents ever thought of him; if they’d found it easy to let him go. Even now, there was no contact between them. He’d never known if it was because they’d preferred it that way or because they’d been too ashamed to try. He preferred to believe the latter.

‘I guess it’s better not really knowing for certain,’ she added, with a wry smile. ‘This way I get to imagine what I want. And we must take our comfort where we can, don’t you think?’

He nodded.

He was reminded of the terror of leaving his parents, his village, even his brothers and sisters whose very existence guaranteed his expulsion from the family. And of the strange, dark figure of Madame Zed, who had taken his small hand firmly in her own and led him away to the station.

‘We have something in common,’ she informed him. They were sitting alone together in the cold, second-class compartment as the train pulled away.

He had tried not to speak; he was afraid of crying if he opened his mouth. But he managed to ask, ‘What’s that?’

‘We are both exiles,’ she said, fixing him with her steady black eyes.

And then, as the train wove through the countryside, she told him the story of how her family were arrested and executed one bright September afternoon at their estate outside St Petersburg, during the Red Terror. And how her old nurse, a devout woman with little care for her own life, had smuggled her out hidden in a hay wagon, wearing a kitchen maid’s clothing and clutching a knife hidden under her coat.

By the time she’d related the details of her journey from St Petersburg to Odessa, penniless and starving, of the unexpected kindness of the naval officers who gave her sanctuary on a British ship to Constantinople, and of her subsequent journey from Malta to Marseille, they were halfway to Paris. The lamps glowed softly in the compartment. It was warmer now; tea and cakes were served from a trolley and Madame had covered him with her own thick woollen travel blanket.

She looked out of the window, at the sun setting behind them, her long, sharp features outlined in shadow against the glass. ‘You will see. We will make our fortune, you and I, and no one, ever again, will be able to tell us where or how to live. Or die.’

Neither of them had ever spoken about their pasts again.

Now, Valmont watched as Eva gathered her cleaning supplies together.

She was an odd girl.

She reminded him of the fresh lemons she’d used for the cleaner but with less rosemary, more bergamot: abrasive, sharp edged but with unexpected softness too.

And without saying anything, he held the door open for her as she pushed her cart out into the hallway.