The Perfume Collector

Paris, Spring, 1955

Madame Zed lifted the stopper off the second bottle, marked Auréole Noire, and passed it to Grace.

‘This is Andre’s second great tribute to Eva. Black Halo,’ she translated.

Grace held it up. The scent rose like an other-worldly incense, full of light and fire, with hypnotic lush white top notes and then a searing drop to intense woody depths. It had a volatile yet enveloping quality; unsettling and overwhelming.

‘It’s extraordinary,’ she murmured.

‘But…?’

‘But unsteady,’ Grace decided, surprised by her own assessment. ‘It’s not a comfortable beauty.’

‘No,’ Madame Zed admitted, looking at her sharply. ‘You’re really quite perceptive.’

Grace passed it back to her.

‘You don’t like it,’ Madame guessed.

‘I don’t know why, but it makes me sad. And a little frightened.’ Grace sat back in her chair. ‘It has no net.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Most things,’ Grace searched for the right words, ‘most things that are meant to be beautiful have a familiar structure – a beginning, middle and end – that acts like a net. You can only fall so far. This perfume doesn’t have that.’

Again, Madame nodded. ‘Yes. You don’t know quite where you’re going to end up. Personally, I admire that.’

‘Do you still have the other perfume? The one that he made for her that smelled like a storm?’

‘Oh, that?’ She thought a moment. ‘No, I’ve never seen it. Perhaps it developed into one of his larger accords, I’m not sure.’

Of all the scents Madame had described, that had been the most intriguing.

‘Eva had an excellent eye,’ Madame continued. ‘She transformed his little shop. The mirrored ceiling, the silk walls… that was all her. The wealthy are fascinated by their reflections. “Give them something new to look at,” she used to say, “even if it’s the tops of their heads, and they will stare at it for hours!”’

‘Was Valmont in love with her?’

‘In his own way, perhaps.’

‘Why didn’t they marry?’

‘The situation was more complex than that. Andre’s real passion was always his work.’

‘So,’ Grace frowned, ‘he wasn’t in love with her?’

Madame Zed thought a moment. ‘He was in love with aspects of her. Andre wasn’t capable of expressing himself like other people. He dreamt in smells, he heard music in colours. In many ways I believe he was a true genius. But he was extremely protective of his way of seeing the world. The smallest thing could distract him and throw him off for days. He wanted Eva’s approval but resented his dependence on her. And they argued over the direction the business should take.’

‘Why?’

‘Eva wanted him to create mass-produced scents as well as personal commissions. But Andre didn’t believe in it. They had bitter disagreements about it.’

‘Yes,’ Grace conceded, ‘but how can a perfumer not believe in selling perfume?’

Madame stiffened. ‘He didn’t believe in selling everyone the same perfume. She got her way in the end, though.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘She sold one of his formulations to Hiver during the war. She betrayed everything Andre believed in.’

Grace thought back to what the shop assistant had told them in the Galeries Lafayette: the Hiver perfume created by a small outside house during the war, a formula that couldn’t be reproduced… ‘Are you talking about Ce Soir?’

She nodded. ‘Even the name is common.’

Grace sat forward. ‘But why would she do such a thing?’

Madame Zed shook her head, her face suddenly drained of colour. ‘During the occupation, Andre was arrested, taken to Drancy concentration camp. Eva got it into her head that she could persuade Hiver to use his influence with the Third Reich to have Andre released. But she needed to make it worth his while, to prove that Andre could be indispensable to Hiver’s business. Only Hiver was a stupid, shallow man. He took the formula but Andre died in Dachau.’

Grace struggled to take it all in. ‘And yet Eva continued to stay with Hiver after the war?’

Madame flashed her a look. ‘Now you know why we didn’t speak. But Eva had no willpower. By then, she was nothing more than a drunk. You see, for Andre, meeting Eva again in Monte Carlo was a turning point, the beginning of his success. But, for her, it was already too late.’

‘Too late for what?’

‘By the time Andre met her again she’d already been ruined. Even though she was still so young, she’d developed ways of surviving that made her hard. She and Lamb lived far beyond their means. They always had. For years, Eva had tried to put money aside but Lamb drank most of it, gambled the rest. The dresses she wore were remodelled a thousand times. The illusion they presented was just that. They stayed at the finest hotels, placed the biggest bets, knew all the right people. But at a tremendous cost. Though, I believe,’ she added, ‘that for all his faults, Lamb truly cared for her. In fact, I know he did.’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘He did for her something no one else could do.’ Madame eased back into her chair. ‘Love is self-serving – we do all sorts of things for our own comfort and call it love. But revenge is an intimate thing, don’t you think? Would you be willing to enact another person’s vengeance?’

It was a disturbing manifestation of devotion; one that seeded itself uncomfortably in Grace’s imagination.

‘Please don’t misunderstand me,’ Madame continued. ‘He owed her that much. And for once in his life, he made good on his debts.’