This also is one of my favorite Budayeen stories, mostly because it spotlights one of my favorite characters in that world, Bill the Cab Driver. Bill is a minor character in all three of the novels: Having won the lottery, he spent all the money to have one of his lungs removed and replaced with a sac containing a lifetime supply of the most powerful hallucinogen known to the underworld, time-released into his bloodstream so that Bill can be permanently, blissfully, and devastatingly stoned for the rest of his days, a condition which doesn’t improve his cab driving any.
Bill is, in his way, a very New Orleans character — like Safiyya the Lamb Lady, who also figures in the story, and Laila who runs the moddy shop. Certainly there are enough dented fenders in New Orleans to attest to the fact that, for a long time, Louisiana had no open-container law. Maybe they still don’t. George was fascinated by the strange New Orleans street-people who wandered around the French Quarter for years.
“Trail of Blood” is also one of the few Budayeen stories in which Marîd acts from an almost unselfish motive — that is, without being backed against a wall and put in peril of his own life.
Just one of those things you see on the Street on those long hot Budayeen nights.
— Barbara Hambly
Marîd and the Trail of Blood
THERE IS A SAYING: “THE BUDAYEEN HIDES FROM the light.” You can interpret that any way you like, but I’m dissolute enough to know exactly what it means. There’s a certain time of day that always makes me feel as if my blackened soul were just then under the special scrutiny of Allah in Paradise.
It happens in the gray winter mornings just at dawn, when I’ve spent the entire night drinking in some awful hellhole. When I finally decide it’s time to go home and I step outside, instead of the cloaking forgiveness of darkness, there is bright, merciless sun shining on my aching head.
It makes me feel filthy and a little sick, as if I’d been wallowing in a dismal gutter all night. I know I can get pretty goddamn wiped out, but I don’t believe I’ve ever sunk to wallowing; at least, I don’t remember it if I did. And all the merchants setting up their stalls in the souks, all the men and women rising for morning prayers, they all glare at me with that special expression: They know exactly where I’ve been. They know I’m drunk and irredeemable. They give freely of contempt that they’ve been saving for a long time for someone as depraved and worthless as me.
This is not even to mention the disapproving expression on Youssef’s face last Tuesday, when he opened the great wooden front door at home. Or my slave, Kmuzu. Both of them knew enough not to say a word out loud, but I got the full treatment from their attitudes, particularly when Kmuzu started slamming down the breakfast things half an hour later. As if I could stand to eat. All I wanted to do was collapse and sleep, but no one in the household would allow it. It was part of my punishment.
So that’s how this adventure began. I reluctantly ate a little breakfast, ignored the large quantity of orders, receipts, ledgers, and other correspondence on my desk, and sat back in a padded leather chair wishing my mortal headache would go away.
Now, when I first had my brain wired, I was given a few experimental features. I can chip in a device that makes my body burn alcohol faster than the normal ounce an hour; last night had been a contest between me and my hardware. The liquor won. I could also chip in a pain-blocking daddy, but it wouldn’t make me any more sober. For now, in the real world, I was as sick as a plague-stricken wharf rat.
I watched a holoshow about a sub-Saharan reforestation program, with the sound turned off. Before it was over, I lied to myself that I felt just a tiny bit better. I even pretended to act friendly toward Kmuzu. I forgave him, and I forgave myself for what I’d done the night before. I promised both of us that I’d never do it again.
I laughed; Kmuzu didn’t. He turned his back and walked out of the room without saying a word.
It was obvious to me that it wasn’t a good day to spend around the house. I decided to go back to the Budayeen and open my nightclub at noon, a little early for the day shift. Even if I had to sit there by myself for a couple of hours, it would be better company than I had at home.
About 12:15, Pualani, the beautiful real girl, came in. She was early for work, but she had always been one of the most dependable of the five dancers on the day shift. I said hello, and before she went to the dressing room she sat down beside me at the bar. “You hear what happened to crazy Vi, who works by Big Al’s Old Chicago?”
“No,” I said. I can’t keep up with what goes on with every girl, deb, and sexchange in the Budayeen.
“She turned up dead yesterday. They say they found her body all drained of blood, and she had two small puncture marks on her neck. It looks like some kind of vampire jumped on her or something.” Pualani shuddered.
I closed my eyes and rubbed my throbbing temples. “There are no such things as vampires,” I said. “There are no afrits, no djinn, no werewolves, no succubae, and no trolls. There has to be some other explanation for Vi.” I recognized the woman’s name, but I couldn’t picture her face.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, a murderer with an elaborate scheme to throw suspicion on a supernatural suspect, maybe.”
“I don’t think so,” Pualani said. “I mean, everything just fits.”
“Uh-huh,” I said.
Pualani went into the back to change into her working outfit. I reached over the bar and filled a tall glass with ice, then poured myself a carbonated soft drink.
Chiriga, my partner, arrived not long after. She owned half the club and acted as daytime barmaid. I was glad to see her because it meant that I didn’t have to watch the place anymore. I rested my head on my arms and let the hangover headache do its throbbing worst.
Nothing felt fatal until someone shook my shoulder. I tried to ignore it, but it wouldn’t go away. I sat up and saw Yasmin, one of the dancers. She was brushing her glistening black hair. “You hear about Vi?” she said.
“Uh-huh.”
“You know I warned Vi about staying out of that alley. She used to go home that way every night. That’s what she gets for working at the Old Chicago and going home that way. I must’ve told her a dozen times.”
I took a deep breath and let it out. “Yasmin, the poor girl didn’t deserve to die just because she walked home through an alley.”
Yasmin cocked her head to one side and looked at me. “Yeah, I know, but still. You hear they think it was Sheba who killed her?”
That was news to me. “Sheba?” I asked. “She worked here maybe eight or nine months ago? That Sheba?”
Yasmin nodded. “She’s over by Fatima and Nassir’s these days, and she belongs there.”
Chiri wiped the bar beside me and tossed a coaster in front of Yasmin. “Why do you think it was Sheba who killed crazy Vi?” Chiri asked.
‘Cause,” Yasmin said in a loud whisper. “Vi was killed by a vampire, right? And you never see Sheba in the daytime. Never. Have you? Think about it. Let me have some peppermint schnapps, Chiri.”
I glanced at Chiri, but she only shrugged. I turned back to Yasmin. “First everybody’s sure Vi was killed by a vampire, and now you’re sure that the vampire is Sheba.”
Yasmin raised both hands and tried to look innocent. “I’m not making any of this up,” she said. She scooped up her peppermint schnapps and went to sit beside Pualani. No customers had come in yet.
“Well,” I said to Chiri, “what do you think?”