The Feathered Serpent

By Robert Leahy

The Langford College Art Museum Director Margaret Anderson is murdered mysteriously in her bed, a red feather replacing her vivisected heart. Pearl, Margaret's closest friend and a psychic, experiences confusing images related to the murder. Offering to help the police, Pearl connects with the local Orlando TV news anchorman Nick Rondinaro. Nick

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pen Culture Solutions
• Release date: Feb 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9781638120018

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The Feathered Serpent

Copyright © 2021 by Robert Leahy.

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-63812-000-1

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-63812-001-8

All rights reserved. No part in this book may be produced and transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Published by Pen Culture Solutions 02/12/2021

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Prologue

Margaret yelled Astro, don’t kill that duckling! Astro hesitated then released the squawking duck near a palm tree at the lake’s edge. "Aren’t alligators and snakes enough for a mother to fight? Come here, Terrorist! " she demanded.

Suddenly a flash of ruby light struck the bird feeder under the old oak nearby. Startled, she stared at the clear domed feeder, afraid to move. As the Florida sunset splashed scarlet into the lake under a slivered moon, she focused on the art museum across the lake at Langford College, where she and her husband worked, but weirdly Michelangelo’s Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel flashed into her mind. Stunned, she felt her racing heart.

But when a wind gust blew through her hair, like an invisible hand, she signaled Astro and ran toward the pool deck terrified. Looking back she saw a flock of cardinals attack the feeder. She was surprised when her cell phone on the table rang, but forced herself to breathe deeply several times.

Oh, hi Honey. Still at your office?

Yes. Are you O.K, Sweetheart? You sound upset.

Just some weird stuff around the lake, I’ll be O.K. You going to be home soon for our anniversary party?

Sorry, I’m running late, the president needs an updated faculty report today. Apologies.

Ah, the life of Langford’s Provost. But a Kendall Jackson cabernet and I are waiting she teased, trying to shake her fear. "Of course President Thompson needs you. But I want you!"

And I love Langford’s Art Museum Director.

"Oh, don’t grovel. I feel so lucky we’ll celebrate our twentieth anniversary tonight! And let’s plan where to make love on our twenty- first. So the wine and I will be waiting for you upstairs. I’ll be the amorous one in the red nightgown. Bye, Lover" she whispered seductively.

The cardinals and ducks chattered nervously as she looked toward the lake, then up at the moon. The moon made her think of her psychic friend Pearl, who gave her the golden retriever Astro. Then suddenly, in another flash of ruby light, she saw a cardinal drop to the ground under the feeder, and the other red birds scatter.

She yelled, Astro, get up here. Astro froze then reacted dutifully to the edge in her voice. Starting slowly up the beach, he stopped, sniffed the cardinal then grabbed it. He dropped the bird at her feet.

You didn’t kill that bird? she asked, her insides quivering.

As he nosed its limp head, she was afraid to touch it. When she looked at the feeder abandoned so suddenly, feeling eerily cold, she grabbed the wine and hurried toward the house.

She turned on the TV to distract herself from the dead bird. She heard Nick Rondinaro’s voice filled with concern about Hurricane Diego poised in the Caribbean, ready to strike Florida. As his picture stabilized, she admired how even when delivering ominous news, her handsome friend looked calm. But as she tried to concentrate on Nick’s voice, the dead bird, unusual light bursts and the image of Michelangelo’s Last Judgment worried her. She kept looking toward the feeder under the oak and the dead bird on the deck.

Finally, she forced herself to focus on Raymond and their anniversary and wanting to shower for tonight’s seduction.

Carrying the wine and two glasses, she put on a reading lamp in the living room near the brass rack holding her orchids. But as she walked upstairs, she remembered the alarm. Although they lived in a lovely neighborhood, she agreed with Raymond to set it when she was alone in bed.

Back upstairs, in the hallway, she stopped for a moment at Pearl’s self-portrait. She loved the bold colors. It was filled with a talented young painter’s promise, but the unfinished face still bothered her. Then eerily, she wondered where Pearl was at this moment, as if the bird and Pearl and the Last Judgment were somehow connected. But she blocked the bizarre thought with a courageous laugh.

Minutes later, in warm spray splashing over her in the shower she remembered making love with Raymond in Michelangelo’s art filled Florence. She soaped her body slowly. She enjoyed the scented bubbles generated by slow circles she massaged onto her skin, and remembered making love with him on the black sand of a volcanic Maui beach. Gently rubbing the mound between her legs, she thought about being a woman. Mound of Venus was an apt title, she thought. Loving Raymond and her daughter Amanda connected her with this mysterious place of Eros and birth.

Finally, back in their bedroom, she perfumed the sheer red nightgown that so aroused Raymond, and smiled, anticipating his reaction tonight.

In bed, she opened the book about reading auras that Pearl gave her at one of their private sessions in the Crystal Pyramid Bookstore in Argo. She smiled, thinking she would read Raymond’s aura tonight as a pretense to seduce him.

Auras seemed fanciful to her, and she knew that Pearl was skeptical, but it felt like harmless fun. She paged through it, sipping cabernet from the glass on the night table, enjoying fantasies about making love with Raymond next year on another secluded Maui beach or any place in the world. Although the dead bird lingered uneasily in her mind, she luxuriated in erotic feelings of Raymond pressed lovingly into her.

In the museum last week, Pearl insisted that their happiness was authentic because she connected spiritually with Raymond and Amanda. Pearl said her love for Raymond was open and intimate. Her love for Amanda completed her as a woman. Her career completed that third part of herself. Margaret was so happy that Pearl saw her life so clearly.

Suddenly Margaret heard a static buzz from the clock radio next to her bed. The block red numbers flashed twelve as the reading lamp went black. Confused by the sound, she looked first at the radio then terrified she looked around the room frantically.

Raymond? she screamed.

Beyond the foot of the bed, an intense ruby light pulsed through sheer lace curtains. She tried to make sense of the formless light that taunted her in the yard. But the mattress dipped, as if someone were sitting beside her.

Her brain turned electric and tingled with fear as she started to perspire. She felt a hand grab her jaw, but she saw only pulsing ruby light. She trembled. Then the hand squeezed her throat violently.

Suddenly, something incredibly cold and hard stabbed her chest. She felt a blade plunged deep into her, ripping jaggedly, as if to cut out her beating heart. Feeling blood explode from her heart, she tried to scream, but made no sound through the hand clamped around her throat. She struggled against the tearing blade, but she disintegrated into a white-hot flash of pain as she saw the Last Judgment. Her hands fell inertly over the bed.

Astro howled in the kitchen. Silently, the ruby light dissolved through the curtained window, leaving square-limbed red numbers pulsing twelve on the clock. In Margaret’s nightgown, between her slashed breasts, in the bloody cavity where her heart had been, appeared a large red feather.

Chapter 1

Red Feathers

Pearl saw Cassandra slither through ferns into morning fog over the lake. She shrieked when a light beam, like a stab to her chest, spotlighted chaotic red feathers in the black cat’s mouth. Angrily, she turned to reread The Orlando Chronicle headline about Margaret’s murder, feeling the cardinal’s death an omen. Then she looked at Magic, her white Persian cat resting on the couch, and tossed the paper onto the coffee table to embrace him. She cradled and stroked Magic, who purred and nuzzled her hand.

Magic, who killed Margaret?

She studied Magic’s watchful eyes in his snow white face. Rubbing Magic’s head, her heart pulsed into her throat.

Images poured over her: red feathers, a black cat, the suspension bridge, a tolling clock tower, a frescoed stone cathedral’s stained glass windows shattering, a full moon turned blood red in a black sky, sacrificial victims plunged down rocky steps, and the Old Whore Death, taunting her.

Her eyes closed, she bowed and shook her head slowly. Amidst the chaos, an image flashed in her mind of Crystal giving her Magic in New Orleans, and calling this seeing a gift. She breathed hard and listened to her heartbeat. She heard Crystal say: Pearl you were born for greatness.

God has purposes that we don’t understand. Cherish your visions. They will guide you to your place in the universe.

Overwhelmed by death, her anger dissolved like a wave abandoning a beach full of shells; it exposed the tragic image on the suspension bridge at Cornell that shattered her life almost thirty years ago. She stroked Magic and struggled with turbulent feelings. Suddenly, she heard Coquina’s voice.

Pearl, turn on Channel Four News. Nick Rondinaro mentioned you. You there, Sweet Pea?

Immersed in images, she started toward the wicker rocking chair to get the remote then grabbed the phone.

Coquina said, "You’re there, Pearl, thank God. This is weird. Even Nick Rondinaro said it would take a psychic to solve it. Pearl, this one’s out there!"

Did he say I knew Margaret? she asked, her hand shaking, as she started to pace around the living room, holding the phone and remote.

"Yes. He said he and you were close friends of hers. But I know how much you loved her."

Pearl winced. Coquina, I loved her like the sister I never had. She was my closest friend. What can’t the police explain? she asked, clicking on the TV, anxiously waiting for the picture to appear in the black screen.

How she died.

"The Orlando Chronicle said she was murdered."

"But how? They only said it was brutal. I’ve got a feeling it’s some kinda Satanic cult, Sweet Pea. Have you had any visions yet?"

"Some confusing religious images."

"Why you call visions just images bothers me. A psychic has to embrace the spirit world, engage the universe."

"I’ve gotten images since I was a kid. Visions sound like there is a Grand Design, a bit too cosmic for me. I leave it to astrologers for cosmic explanations. Do they suspect her husband Raymond? Pearl asked, then took a deep breath and sighed. O.K., I see Nick Rondinaro."

"You hear Rondinaro just say Murdered wives point fingers at living husbands? Her husband found her and called 911. He’s denying involvement. But he’s scared. I’d love to do his chart. Raymond said he found her body on their bed. If he’s not lying, my guess is he’s next.

You watch. It’s a cult! Like those vampire killers they caught in Lake County. The police said there was a struggle. Hear what Rondinaro just said, The cause of death is a mystery, pending an autopsy. The Boys in Blue are scared to tell what really happened, Sweet Pea. This is too weird for words. I’m getting serious bad vibes. You oughtta stay out of it."

Coquina, control your imagination. Please! she said.

When Pearl saw the yellow police tape wrapped around several trees in the front yard of Margaret’s beautiful house, she paced and struggled with bizarre images.

Her chest burned when she breathed. She stared at Nick Rondinaro, watching his eyes to see how Margaret’s death affected him. She saw fear spawned by incomprehension.

She felt compassion for this man Margaret respected, a man who impressed her with charm and self-assurance. Then he moved onto another story, and her eyes drifted toward the lake as Margaret’s life disappeared in the rush of more news. Holding the phone to her ear, saying nothing, she clicked off the TV.

You still there, Pearl? I wonder what your mentor Crystal would say?

I wonder, she said, as images continued to appear.

"You told me Crystal advised you to leave Tampa to avoid those horrible fights with your mother. To stop wasting your life as a party- girl and follow your vision."

"The party-girl life was years ago. I’m making sense of my life these days, as best I can."

"I just can’t see you as a party-girl. Just can’t. You have too much class."

"Class was only money on a plane. When I dropped out of Cornell, being a flight attendant in First Class was like tending a stable of erection- jockeys. But I wanted to find a man to love."

"Erection-jockeys! Geez, you can get as crude as the rest of us. That’s what I like about you. I’m a plain pudgy frizzy haired ex-Jew. But I can see why guys want you. You’ve got gorgeous blond hair, emerald green eyes and the body of a tall Rockette! Geez, get with it. But you’re gonna have to find an incredibly special guy. You have so much going for you. But you have to resolve that shit with your mom. You foreseeing your dad’s death must have terrified her. But Crystal thinks you’re gifted."

"Foreseeing death is being gifted? she said flatly. Weird images flooded me today when I saw Cassandra carrying the dead cardinal. I’ve been getting religious images, mostly Christian and Mayan all morning, like the beginning of some religious war. Margaret’s death is linked with them…different from when I saw my father fall from the scaffolding at the Hyatt in Tampa. So weird," she said, then turning from the window, she walked toward the fireplace, thinking about Margaret.

"Crystal insists you’re the most gifted psychic she ever met. But I’m telling you, there are evil spirits involved. Stay out of it!"

I can’t stay out of my best friend’s murder, Pearl said, standing for a moment by the fireplace mantle.

She stretched her hand to touch several flowers on the orchid Margaret gave her, thinking her friend couldn’t be dead. Holding her fingers to her lips, she drifted from her conversation with Coquina, worried about the flood of images.

"Police work chews up your tender soul. Like when you helped the police find that female serial killer. You know I worry about you, Sweet Pearl. Don’t get freaked out about your friend’s murder, let the police figure it out, Sweet Pea" she said, her voice strained.

Thanks for your concern, Coquina. I’ll be O.K. she said, but her mind went numb.

Pearl, you’re going weird on me

It can’t be Raymond she whispered. "What did you say? I can’t hear you!"

Damn your cat! she said, angrily. He killed a cardinal this morning.

You’ve lost it. You want me to come over? I don’t want you freaking- out over this.

No, seriously, Coquina. That bird’s death and Margaret’s murder are connected, she insisted. "Coquina, it can’t be Raymond. Otherwise everything Crystal said about this gift would be wrong."

Sweet Pea, should I count the times you told me you wished you never met Crystal? You whine that Spring Break dare from your Ivy League friends at Mardi Gras went horribly wrong. You wanted to be an architect like your father not a psychic!

Oh, come on, Coquina. I’m not that weird. Am I? she said, uncomfortable hearing Coquina repeat things she said in frustration, when she tried to make sense of a life that threatened her sanity.

"Not weird? Get with it, Sweet Pea. I’ve been in Argo thirty years.

But you’re the weirdest piece of Christmas wrapping I’ve ever met. I gotta do your chart someday. Geez, I mean good old Molly McIntire, who left Maine to found this town because the constellation Argo is visible from here, had one spirit guide—a Native American named Gluscabi. In the three years you’ve been here, living next door to