Batthew Aromascent and the Missing Corpse Flower, page 1
CONTENTS
Title Page
The Before Bit: The Newborn Nose
Bit 1: The Smell of Excitement
Bit 2: Flowers and Misdemeanours
Bit 3: Of Mysteries and Meddling
Bit 4: The Goodbye Hug
Bit 5: Room With a View
Bit 6: In a Scent Until Proven Guilty
Bit 7: Sniffing Around
Bit 8: The Museum District
Bit 9: The Puff-Tuk
Bit 10: The Outré Museum
Bit 11: The Room of One Million Aromas
Bit 12: Just Another Bit
Bit 13: What’s In a Name?
Bit 14: Making Old New Again
Bit 15: Streetpig
Bit 16: Artemesius Musk
Bit 17: Deep Smog
Bit 18: Rock-Bottom Boy
Bit 19: Batthew Aromascent
Bit 20: Where Have All The Flowers Gone?
Bit 21: Cesspools And Sinks. Near The End
Bit 22: Flower Power
Bit 23: A Glimpse of Sorts
Bit 24: Right Under His Nose
Bit 25: The New Boss
Glossary
Acknowledgements
About the Authors
Copyright Page
To Greg, the Number Two Smellper Helper
THE BEFORE BIT
THE NEWBORN NOSE
Experts say that when a Nose is born, every rose on earth tilts in their direction. Yes, we admit it sounds a bit far-fetched! The tilt of each rose is so microscopically small that for a long time nobody had any proof of it ever happening. That slight touch of rose in the air had never been detected. Until one day … a soft essence was thrown.
On the day he was born, a crowd gathered in the cobblestone square of Ambrosial Place. At a glance, the whole city might have been there. People were using all their cleverness to find the best spots to watch this decidedly historical event. Onlookers perched atop the gates of the Botanic Gardens, they hung from tree branches, they balanced on roofs and lamp posts. Uniformed school groups huddled together. One delighted spectator hovered above the crowd in his very own homemade hot air balloon. Even members of the Candlenut Police Department had abandoned their duties, hoping to gain a better vantage point than everybody else. The normal rules of order were right out the window. All eyes were fixed on the balcony above. Everybody wanted to be the first to see the new Aromascent boy!
The smell of a billion tilted roses journeyed through the city streets into the Botanic Gardens, where it picked up the zesty zing of freshly cut grass and mixed with the assorted aromas among the crowd. It danced through the grand, old entrance of the Olfactory Fragrance House and floated merrily down the halls, blending with the scent of buttery pancakes bubbling away on an oily pan in the factory’s kitchen. The smell floated up the stairs to the biggest bedroom and reached the nose of a new mother and a just-as-new baby. The mother’s nose wriggled. The baby’s nose did, too.
‘How ’bout that, eh?’ The mother smiled before drifting into a well-deserved sleep. The smell of roses danced in the air before the breeze escorted it down the road.
The father leant in to get a better look at his new baby. And there was something peculiar about this father. He was the sort of fellow who twinkled, even on a grey day. You would stop and stare if you were lucky enough to walk past him on a crowded street. There was no mistaking the man for someone ordinary, that’s for stonkin’ sure.
But by far his most prominent feature was his nose – glorious and structural, like a grand instrument on display. This father was Roger Aromascent, and Roger Aromascent was famous for being quite possibly THE best living Nose in the whole wide world, matched only by the at-the-moment-sleeping-in-the-bed-beside-him mother, Joy Aromascent.
A moment to explain. There are noses and there are Noses. A nose is a common thing. You have one right there in the middle of your face – the knobbly thing helping you smell and breathe. But a Nose with a capital ‘N’ is anything but ordinary. A Nose with a capital ‘N’ is a very special person born with an extraordinary sense of smell. This new father was a Nose. Capital ‘N’.
New father, Roger Aromascent, opened a worn-out leather diary and wrote:
The smell of your first day:
Sea breeze
Freshly cut grass
Pancakes
and one billion tilting roses
The Aromascents were, in no uncertain terms, somewhat of a big deal. Because to us, a smell is just a smell – something that reminds us when we are hungry or where the pie shop is or when we need to have a bath. But to the people who live in this book, a smell is much more than just a smell. To the people in this book, a smell is a mystery to be solved. It can be a question or an answer. A wingless transporter to most cherished memories. A way of letting someone know that you love them, or that they should probably just leave you alone. A smell helps early birds jump out of bed every morning, ready to make the most of the opportunities that zoom their way. To the people who live in this book, a smell begins the day and ends it.
Roger Aromascent was closing his diary when he was struck by something unmistakeably rancid. A nurse was heading in his direction, wearing a perfume that may or may not have been brewed in a dirty bucket in somebody’s backyard.
Maybe the nurse should never have trusted a bargain bin in the Experiments and Mishaps section of the Candlenut Watermarkets. And maybe we shouldn’t always believe those experts who dream up madcap notions about tilting roses. But whatever the case may be, the nurse’s perfume was a nose-wrinkling broth. It was bad. Bin juice bad. Like sickly-sweet, coconut-infused bin juice that surges up your nose and lands on the tip of your tongue bad. It was a perfume so vile that a billion tilted roses couldn’t soften its stench. Which is why Roger Aromascent spluttered, and why his new baby cried.
‘Not to worry, by boy,’ soothed Roger, snuffling back a stuffy cold that was turning his ‘Ms’ to ‘Bs’. He pinched the baby’s button nose gently. ‘Here, this lebon bight help.’ Roger Aromascent plucked a lemon from a fruit bowl by the bed and dangled it above the baby’s nostrils. The baby cried louder.
‘No?’ Roger Aromascent returned the lemon to the bowl. ‘Oh, I’m not buch of a citrus fellow either. Let’s get a bit of air, shall we?’
The happy father scooped up his baby and crept past the sleeping mother. A gentle breeze met them on the balcony.
‘Can you sbell that? That’s peanut butter and honey!’ said Roger to the baby, leaning over the railing. His blocked nose trumpeted as he breathed in, vacuuming up the invisible particles in the breeze. ‘And on rye bread and …’ he took another sniff. ‘Gawhiffakers! It’s toasted!’
Ignoring the spectators, Roger Aromascent pointed past the cobblestones of Ambrosial Place, past the forest of ferns in the Botanic Gardens, past Downtown Candlenut, past the shanty town of Deep Smog, past the docks of Port Pourri and right out into the middle of the ocean, where a sailor in a yellow raincoat was standing on the deck of his boat.
The sailor had removed a toasted peanut butter and honey on rye sandwich from his lunch box, which was being eyed off by a pair of hungry seagulls. If it weren’t for his blocked nose, the new father – way back on Olfactory’s balcony – would have also picked up the smell of the poppyseeds on top of the sandwich.
‘Welcobe to the world, kiddo.’ Roger beamed, holding the baby high in his arms so he could soak up all the new smells that the city of Candlenut had to offer. The great Nose’s free hand conducted the air. ‘It’s a world of adventure and possibility!’
The crowd roared with approval. The weight of expectation is a heck of a thing. This little baby was born with it on his shoulders.
‘Oh, he’ll be the best Nose Candlenut has ever seen,’ commented an onlooker below. ‘Mark my words.’
‘The world,’ someone nearby corrected. ‘The best the world has ever seen.’
‘Mr Aromascent?’ the nurse called from the bedroom, flanked by the malodorous reek of her bucket-brewed perfume. By Almairac’s snout! The stench of the funky perfume collided with Roger’s nostrils with the ZAP of a lightning-powered sports car. The world-famous Nose began to splutter, gripping the railings of the balcony to keep himself stable. Invisible perfume tidal waves crashed into his nose.
The nurse dangled a blank birth certificate in front of him. ‘What are we calling the little one?’
Roger and Joy Aromascent had already decided that their new baby would be named after Joy’s grandfather; the celebrated, world-famous fragrance scientist, Dr Matthew Attar-Whiffington. So that is what Roger, with a destiny-making blocked nose, told the bargain-bin-perfume-lathered nurse. The nurse gave Roger a look of surprise, shrugged, and whipped a palm tree-shaped pen from behind her ear. And with a few flicks of a wrist, that was that. Batthew was official.
The Candlenut Tribune
FAMOUS NOSES GO MISSING IN THE SUMATRAN RAINFOREST!
Candlenut is heartbroken! The city’s most celebrated noses, Joy and Roger Aromascent, have officially been declared missing. The Aromascents, owners of Candlenut’s oldest and most famous fragrance house, Olfactory, recently embarked upon an expedition to Sumatra to find and preserve the unique smells of its dying ecosystems.
Roger and Joy Aromascent were last heard from weeks ago, when a single seed of a Titan Arum, a highly endangered plant also known as the ‘corpse flower’, arriv
A search party failed to uncover any trace of the pair. A local told The Candlenut Tribune, ‘the rainforest is thick with danger – tigers, snakes, venomous wasps, and worse … the Aromascents are not the first to be lost in the rainforest.’ Sumatran authorities fear the worst.
In the Aromascents’ absence, management of the Olfactory Fragrance House will be taken over by Roger’s older sister, Arabella Aromascent. Arabella will also act as guardian for the couple’s five-year-old son, Batthew Aromascent. Bless his poor little cotton socks.
BIT 1
THE SMELL OF EXCITEMENT
(Years Later)
The smell of seven in the morning had been Batthew’s alarm clock for as long as he could remember. Instead of hearing ‘WAKE UPPPPP!’ or ‘TIME FOR SCHOOL!’, Batthew smelt freshly baked bread and newspaper ink as the postman wheeled by his bedroom window. And of course, he smelt perfume – every scent the air could hold, brewing in his family’s factory above his head.
‘Morning, Batthew!’ The postman tossed a fresh copy of The Candlenut Tribune through the open window. ‘Exciting news today!’
Exciting news? Batthew felt his nose twitch.
He sprung from bed, scooped up the newspaper, and leant out the window so his body stretched out over the cobblestone pavement of Ambrosial Place. Batthew Aromascent was short for his age, and his nose was a bit smaller than he would have liked. He had a mop of slack, dark hair that drooped down over his face and always seemed to get in the way of his big, brown eyes.
Across the road, outside the Botanic Gardens, a crowd was gathering. The cheery mob spilt out across the pavement in a ramshackle line that disappeared around the corner. Some chatted excitedly while they reclined in camping chairs, reading books or knitting. Others handed over shiny doubloons for delicious snacks. And one crowd member had even begun to instruct the people nearby as to how to best stretch out their legs for optimal queuing.
Peculiar.
Batthew took a deep breath in through his nose, his nostrils jabbering.
He smelt pungent eucalyptus leaves and swirls of spicy chai. Rich coffee, oily leather shoes and … mountain yaks? He shook his head, frustrated, and flushed the air out of his nose.
For a Master Nose, a breath in is like reading a book with a single glance, only instead of words, it’s smells that fill their heads. But Batthew Aromascent was by no means a Master Nose. Nor did it look like he was ever going to be, the way he saw it.
He tried again, inhaling through his nose. There were the eucalyptus leaves and the swirls of spicy chai. Rich coffee, oily leather shoes and … what was catching the tip of his nose? There was something new in the air this morning. It was faint. Was it something musky? Minty? Burnt sugar with a bit of a twist? He lifted the loose floorboard beneath the windowsill and reached into his hiding spot, sifting through a stack of old toys, his broken compass, the worn map of Sumatra and some South Candlenut Stink Beetles trading cards, looking for his dad’s old diary. This was where Batthew recorded new smells. He flipped the diary to an empty page and peered at the crowd across the street. Peculiar, for sure. He wrote down:
The smell of excitement?
‘BATTHEW!’ Aunt Bella’s voice swooped under the door from upstairs, feathering around the room like the sort of bird call we only ever hear on happy mornings.
Batthew skipped to the last page of his dad’s diary. The letter from his parents – the last he had ever heard from them – was nestled inside the back cover. The paper was worn and crumpled from all the times he had taken it out to re-read it. The words were messy, as though they had been hastily scrawled across the page. Batthew pocketed the letter and put the diary back in its hiding spot under the floorboard. He yanked on his sneakers and ran out of his bedroom towards the lobby. Soon, he was in front of two very familiar steel doors.
He pulled them wide open.
The sun glimmered brilliantly through the enormous windows of the Olfactory Main Laboratory, catching the shiny metal of a row of gigantic vats, each bubbling away with a different brew: ROSEMARY AND COCONUT, declared one sign, MORNING DEW, declared another.
But perhaps you’ve already heard stories about the Olfactory Main Laboratory? Some Candlenutians speak of hidden side rooms and secret passageways. Others mention the architecture – sky high walls of stone, tangles of ladders and brass pipes, and the glorious domed glass ceiling right in the centre of the lab. At night, the glass dome throws beams of celestial light onto the lab floor, while in the day, it fills the lab with the warmth of the whole sun.
The lab hummed. Whether it was the cosy bubbling of huge urns, the copper chimneys that whistled like teapots in the Steam Room, or the tapping of busy feet across the polished floorboards as lab assistants transported all manner of materials across the floor, the Olfactory Main Laboratory never switched off.
Batthew made his way across the lab floor, weaving through the morning activity. Technicians were throwing together exciting new flavours while machines churned, their enormous hammers – as tall as buildings – ramming up and down on spices. The Distillation experts, surrounded by water vapour, waved little hygrometers about the air. A slender and scraggy lab technician was shaking her head in confusion at a big red dial, saying, ‘Vanilla with petrichor … these are very odd results. Maybe some maple would do the trick.’
‘Batthew, catch!’ Another lab technician was balancing precariously atop a tall ladder propped up against a cauldron labelled: GINGER ESSENCE AND CHRISTMAS TREES. The technician dipped a small vial into the cauldron, scooped up its contents, and stoppered the vial with a small cork. With a wink, he tossed the vial to Batthew. Batthew unpopped the cork and took a deep breath in. Not bad!
‘There’s my favourite eleven-year-old!’ His aunt, Bella, appeared in front of him.
The bottom of Bella’s brand-new green dress tumbled across the checkerboard floor. Aunt Bella always looked stylish. ‘To underdress is a crime,’ she liked to tell him. Batthew preferred his old South Candlenut Stink Beetles T-shirt to any ensemble in his aunt’s wardrobe. He and Bella were about as similar as a rhino and a toothpick. She could charm the polka dots off a ladybird. She loved the events, the people, the sparkle. But despite the heels and the glamour, she was always there to walk with him to school every morning. And it was never a dull time with Aunt Bella.
Bella twirled, the dress shimmering brilliantly in the morning light. ‘Well? What do you think?’
‘Sparkly?’ Batthew suggested.
‘Today is a sparkly kind of day. Don’t you know?’ Bella was delighted. She plucked the newspaper from his hand and waved it about with a dramatic flourish. ‘Have you read the news? The whole city is talking about it. The Titan Arum has finally bloomed!’
Of course! The line outside the gates! How had he not realised before? That explains the smell of excitement, he thought. Batthew felt a surge of nervous energy rising from somewhere in his guts, as though he’d swallowed a lightning bolt.
Aunt Bella read the newspaper headline, ‘THE WORLD’S RAREST FLOWER FINALLY BLOOMS.’ She landed a polished fingernail on the front-page image of the Botanic Gardens. ‘From the seed your parents sent from Sumatra. The last of its kind. Blooming just across the street from us here at Olfactory. The big unveiling is this morning! And everyone will be there to see our flower … all the famous Noses, the movie stars, the mayor, and most importantly, the cameras!’ Bella’s face became serious as she glanced down at him. ‘This is an important day for us, Batthew.’
Batthew didn’t need his aunt to tell him how important the Titan Arum blooming was. He had a bedside drawer full of worn ticket stubs to see the flower when it was just a bud.
‘Because this Titan Arum may be the last one left!’ Batthew nodded. ‘Because this is the first time it has ever bloomed! Because it’s the biggest flower in the world! Because apparently it stinks like a rotting corpse! Because …’
‘Because,’ Bella corrected him, ‘this is our chance to remind the world that Olfactory is still the finest fragrance house in Candlenut. So it has always been, and so it will be forever. No thanks to those bossy, bilgy, computer-sniffing young upstarts over at StreetPig! Honestly …’ Bella tossed the newspaper onto a nearby table. ‘Fragrance houses used to be described with words like elegance and sophistication!’
