investigated for years. Our files on the Mayfairs went back for centuries. Members of our 
Order had died at the hands of the Mayfair Witches, as we were wont to call them. But 
this child mustn't know about them through us, I had realized quite suddenly, at least 
not until Aaron had made up his mind that such an intervention would serve the good of 
both parties, and do no harm.
  As it was, such a time never came to pass. Merrick's life was complete and separate 
from that of the white Mayfairs. There is nothing of their story in these pages that I 
now write.
  But on that long ago evening, Aaron and I had sought rather desperately to make our 
minds blank for the little witch who sat before us.
  I don't remember whether or not Merrick had glanced at us before she went on.
  "There are Mayfairs living in that Garden District house even now," she had said 
matter-of-factly, "-white people, who never had much to do with us, except through their 
lawyers." How worldly her little laugh had sounded-the way people laugh when they speak 
of lawyers.
  "The lawyers would come back of town with the money," she said with a shake of her 
head. "And some of those lawyers were Mayfairs; too. The lawyers sent Angelique Marybelle 
Mayfair north to a fine school, but she came home again to live and die right here. I 
would never go to those white people." The remark had been almost offhanded. She went on.
  "But Great Nananne talks about Oncle Julien just as if he was living now, and they all 
said it when I was growing up, that Oncle Julien was a kind man. Seems he knew all his 
colored relations, and they said that man could kill his enemies or yours with the look 
in his eye. He was a houn'gan if there ever was one. I have more to say about him by and 
by."
  She had glanced quite suddenly at Aaron and I'd seen him glance away from her almost 
shyly. I wonder if she had seen the future-that the Talamasca File on the Mayfair Witches 
would swallow Aaron's life, as surely as the Vampire Lestat had swallowed mine.
  I wondered what she thought about Aaron's death even now, as we sat at the cafe table, 
as I spoke softly to the handsome and welldefended woman whom that little girl had become.
  The feeble old waiter brought her the fifth of rum she had requested, the St. James 
from Martinique, dark. I caught the powerful scent of it as he filled her small, heavy 
octagonal glass. Memories flooded my mind. Not the beginning with her, but other times.
  She drank it just the way I knew she would, in the manner I remembered, as if it were 
nothing but water. The waiter shuffled back to his hiding place. She lifted the bottle 
before I could do it for her, and she filled the glass again.
  I watched her tongue move along the inside of her lip. I watched her large searching 
eyes look up again into my face.
  "Remember drinking rum with me?" she asked, almost smiling, but not quite. She was far 
too tense, too alert for that just yet. "You remember," she said. "I'm talking about 
those brief nights in the jungle. Oh, you are so right when you say that the vampire is a 
human monster. You're still so very human. I can see it in your expression. I can see it 
in your gestures. As for your body, it's totally human. There isn't a clue. .  ."
  "There are clues," I said, contradicting her. "And as time passes you'll see them. 
You'll become uneasy, and then fearful and, finally, accustomed. Believe me, I know."
  She raised her eyebrows, then accepted this. She took another sip and I imagined how 
delicious it was for her. I knew that she did not drink every day of her life, and when 
she did drink she enjoyed it very much.
  "So many memories, beautiful Merrick," I whispered. It seemed paramount that I not give 
in to them, that I concentrate on those memories which most certainly enshrined her 
innocence and reminded me of a sacred trust.
  To the end of Aaron's life, he had been devoted to her, though he seldom spoke of it to 
me. What had she learnt of the tragic hit-and-run accident that had caught Aaron 
unawares? I had been already gone out of the Talamasca, out of Aaron's care, and out of 
life.
  And to think we had lived such long mortal lives as scholars, Aaron and I. We should 
have been past all mishap. Who would have dreamt that our research would ensnare us and 
turn our destiny so dramatically from the dedication of those long loyal years? But 
hadn't the same thing happened to another loyal member of the Talamasca, my beloved 
student Jesse Reeves?
  Back then, when Merrick had been the sultry child and I the amazed Superior General, I 
had not thought my few remaining years held any great surprise.
  Why had I not learnt from the story of Jesse? Jesse Reeves had been my student even 
more surely than Merrick ever became, and the vampires had swallowed Jesse whole and 
complete.
  With great devotion Jesse had sent me one last letter, thick with euphemisms, and of no 
real value to anyone else, letting me know that she would never see me again. I had not 
taken Jesse's fate as a caution. I had thought only that for the intense study of the 
vampire, Jesse Reeves had been too young.
  It was all past. Nothing remained of that heartbreak. Nothing remained of those 
mistakes. My mortal life had been shattered, my soul soaring and then fallen, my vampire 
life erasing all the small accomplishments and consolations of the man I'd once been. 
Jesse was among us and I knew her secrets, and that she'd always be quite faraway from me.
  What mattered now was the ghost that Jesse had only glimpsed during her investigations, 
and the ghost story that haunted Louis, and the bizarre request which I now made to my 
be] oved Merrick that she call the ghost of Claudia with all her uncommon skill.
  
  
  2
  
  
  IN THE STILL CAFE,  I watched Merrick take another deep drink of the rum. I treasured 
the interval in which she let her eyes pass slowly over the dusty room.
  I let my mind return to that long ago night at Oak Haven, as the rain struck the 
windowpanes. The air had been warm and heavy with the scent of the oil lamps and the busy 
fire on the hearth. Spring was upon us but the storm had cooled the air. She'd been 
speaking of the white family named Mayfair of whom she knew so little, she said.
  "None of us with any sense would do that," she continued, "go to those white cousins, 
expecting anything from any of them on account of a name." She had brushed it all aside. 
"I'm not going to white people and try to tell them that I'm their own."
  Aaron had looked at me, his quick gray eyes concealing even his tenderest emotions, but 
I knew that he wanted me to respond.
  "There's no need, child," I had said. "You are ours now, if you choose to be. We are 
your own. Why, it's already understood. This is your home forever. Only you can change 
things, if you wish."
  A chill had come over me, of something momentous and meaningful, when I'd spoken those 
words to her. I had indulged the pleasure. "We'll always take care of you." I had 
underscored it, and I might have kissed her had she not been so ripe and pretty, with her 
bare feet on the flowered carpet and her breasts naked beneath her shift.
  She had not replied.
  "All gentlemen and ladies, it seems," Aaron had said, perusing the daguerreotypes. "And