January Jinx: The Calendar Mysteries, #1

By Juliet Kincaid

January Jinx, Book 1 of the cozy historical calendar mystery series

 

The first chance Minty Wilcox gets in January 1899, she sets off to find a job as a stenographer/typist in Kansas City.

 

But her search is jinxed from the start because right off the bat she doesn't even get to her destination because some old man with a gun and a sheriff's badge accuses her of pushing a soldier to his death.

 

In spite of Minty's efforts to clear her name, bad luck soon spreads like a nasty cold from her to her entire family and to Daniel Price, the mysterious stranger who takes a room at her mother's boarding house. And so Minty decides that only she can put things right.

 

That won't be easy in Kansas City where living could get downright deadly a hundred years or so ago.

 

Praise for January Jinx, Book 1 of the Calendar Mystery Series

The delightful, creative, and charming January Jinx introduces a terrific character in Minty Wilcox, a good old-fashioned cozy mystery persona who will surely be able to carry the planned-for series. It's Minty who drives the readable narrative, and author Juliet Kincaid keeps the pace steady and fast at the same time for quite a readable experience . . . The unique setting of 1899 Kansas City is full of flavor that never overwhelms the story and the characters. With a terrific, original, but still comfortable series concept, there are certainly big things afoot for Juliet Kincaid and Minty Wilcox's Calendar Mysteries. (Judge for a Writer's Digest competition)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Juliet Kincaid
• Release date: Jan 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9780989950459

Juliet Kincaid

I’ve been hooked on fiction since grade school. And I’ve always preferred stories that supply adventure and escape. Humor and wit help, too. I try to write the same sort of stories and novels as the ones I like to read. In addition to the Calendar Mystery series, my published work includes the Cinderella, P. I. Fairy Tale Mysteries for grown-ups that feature Cinderella as a detective twenty years, three kids, and a few extra pounds after the ball. (Happy endings guaranteed.) My stories and novels are available as eBooks and trade paperbacks. I have also written and published Novel Basics, a concise yet complete guide to writing a novel. My daughter, Jessica Kincaid, the bead artist, and I live in a house filled with books, mostly detective fiction, just a few miles from where Minty Wilcox and Daniel Price have their adventures in the Calendar Historical Mystery stories and novels. You can contact me at juliet@julietkincaid. com, Juliet_Kincaid on Goodreads, JulietKincaid on Twitter, and JulietKincaidauthor2016 and juliet.kincaid on Facebook. To find out what work I currently have available, sign up for notifications at https://books2read.com/author/juliet-kincaid/subscribe/1/305166/

Book preview

JANUARY JINX

Book 1 of the Calendar Mystery Series

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Mystery and romance in old Kansas City,

a place that could get downright deadly

a hundred years or so ago.

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By Juliet Kincaid

AzureSky Press

AZP

January Jinx © 2014 by Juliet Willman Kincaid. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Juliet Kincaid except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

978-0-9899504-5-9 (eBook)

978-0-9899504-9-7 (trade paperback)

AzureSky Press, LLC

Overland Park, KS

Copyright © 2014 by Juliet Willman Kincaid

Cover by Juliet Kincaid

Cover Photo from Victorian Fashion in America

Kristina Harris, editor

Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, Inc. 2002. Print.

January Jinx is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, and persons, living or dead, and their animals is entirely coincidental.

To Laura Wilcox Perkins, Melicent Perkins,

and Melicent Smith Willman . . .

Although Minty Wilcox, the protagonist of January Jinx, is an imagined character in a work of fiction, she is the offspring of three very real women: my maternal great-grandmother Laura Wilcox Perkins, who rose from her death bed to march with the Suffragettes; her daughter, my great-aunt, Melicent Perkins, who in 1900, at the age of twenty, went to work as a stenographer for a newspaper company where she continued to work for the next sixty-seven years; and my mother, Melicent Smith Willman, who, dissatisfied with working in a cigar factory, went into nurse’s training and became a registered nurse at the age of twenty.

JANUARY JINX

Book 1 of the Calendar Mysteries

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

ALSO BY JULIET KINCAID

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

JULIET KINCAID, WRITER

CHAPTER ONE

Tuesday January 3, 1899

Kansas City, Missouri

The man in the sand-colored uniform swung his duffel bag onto his shoulder and started down the steps of the Ninth Street Incline.

Wait, Soldier Hanks, cried Minty Wilcox. But he’d already reached the first landing, so she clamped her handbag and portfolio under her arm, lifted the skirt of her garnet wool suit to the tops of her high-buttoned shoes, and followed.

The farther down she went, the worse became the dust, the wind, the stench from the cattle yards, and the noise rising from Kansas City’s West Bottoms, site of two hundred saloons and other, less notorious business establishments. A block south of the cable car trestle, across several railroad tracks, stood the Union Depot, grand in spite of the soot covering its clock tower and cupolas. A block north of the trestle was Minty’s destination: Corley and Son Oatmeal and Cereal Company.

Her heart thumped harder at the prospect of arriving at Corley’s and speaking with the manager about a position for a stenographer/typist advertised in the newspaper.

Minty ran into the soldier hanging over the railing. She jumped back. Are you all right, Soldier Hanks?

He spoke into the wind.

I beg your pardon? Minty asked.

He glanced over his shoulder, and then he turned his back to the Bottoms below. When he lurched toward Minty, she retreated up two steps. Why, Christina, he said. You look like an angel, halo and all.

I’m not Christina. I’m . . .

The blue-eyed soldier stared past her.

Wind threw dust into Minty’s face, so she turned away. When she looked again, the soldier was falling backward against the railing. With a shriek of rusty nails, it gave way, and he plummeted to the terrace below.

Soldier Hanks!

Minty rushed down to the next landing. Are you all right? That was a stupid question. Even if his duffel bag had softened his fall, the soldier’s right arm was twisted under him. Eyes shut, he jerked with pain.

Help! We need . . .

A cable car rumbled down the trestle that paralleled the stairs, but only the section above its windows was visible.

No one moved among the shanties on the terraced hillside to the south.

But under the shelters next to the Union Depot far below, the platform held valises and men’s boots and trouser legs. Help! Minty waved her arms. We need help. A train, its big black locomotive dragging a veil of dark smoke, chuffed into the station, hiding the gents from view.

Minty dropped her portfolio and handbag, hiked up her skirts, and climbed over the railing. If Mama finds out I displayed my drawers to the entire West Bottoms like this, Minty thought, she will lock me up for a week.

By the time Minty got to him, the young man was snoring as Papa’s old beagle had done just before he died.

Oh, no, she said. The man’s dying, and it’s all your fault. If, if, if stuttered in her brain. If you hadn’t spoken to him . . . If . . . If . . .

She wiped away her tears and stooped. Soldier Hanks?

What did you go pushing that poor feller for? a man said.

Minty straightened.

A small man in a gray top hat and dirty frock coat slouched against the railing on the landing above her. And him a soldier, too, the man continued.

I didn’t push him, sir. He fell.

Them stairs is mighty steep. The man wheezed as he pinned a badge to his coat.

You’re a police officer. Thank goodness.

Not police, persackly. I’m Sheriff Clayton Cole of Camel, Kansas. He coughed and wiped his mouth. On special sign-up with the Kansas City police.

Camel, Kansas? I never heard of it.

Camp-bell, Kansas.

Oh. She’d never heard of Camp-bell, Kansas, either. Well, I’m glad you came along. You can help.

He coughed. Ain’t this dust been god-awful the last two days?

Oh, the poor man looks terrible. Minty fell to her knees next to the soldier, who somehow had lost his hat. The wound he’d told her he received in Cuba the previous summer glowed a livid red on his forehead.

Look it what I found, said the sheriff. Minty’s portfolio and handbag dangled from his hand.

Those are mine.

So, you say.

I can prove they’re mine. The letters of reference and the résumés in the portfolio say Miss Arminta Meneatha Wilcox. That’s my name.

The man pulled out Minty’s papers. Can’t prove that by me, seeing as how I’m not a reading sort.

You can’t read?

Don’t get pernickety with me, gal. He shoved Minty’s résumés into the portfolio. Good leather in this here case. He tucked it under his arm. Let’s see what’s in this here reticule.

That’s mine, too. I can prove it. If I convince you, will you help me with Soldier Hanks?

The little man reached into her purse. Let’s hear it.

There’s a handkerchief embroidered with dark blue thread in that bag. She would have described the monogram, but saw no sense in it, like putting spectacles on a hog.

Minty glanced down. Hanks’ lips had turned gray. Minty grasped the soldier’s hand and chaffed it, but it lay as still and as cold as a dead fish in her hand. Oh please, please, come help. She beckoned to the sheriff.

Look it here what I done found. The sheriff held up a watch. You ain’t going to tell me this here is yours? He cocked back the tall hat, leaned his elbow on the railing, and swung a watch by its chain. What would a gal like you be doing with a gold watch hanging off a gold Albert?

Albert?

Chain, a watch chain like that there Prince Albert the Queen of England’s married to wears in his photographs. Where you been, gal, that you don’t know what an Albert is?

Minty stuck out her chin. Not the same places as you, sir. That watch belongs to my brother. He loaned it to me.

Why, gal, lying to a sworn officer of the law like that. I’ll just take this here into evidence. He tucked the watch and chain into his vest.

You can’t take that. Great-Uncle Edward left it to my brother Eddie.

Me and you both know you done stole this watch off-a that poor soldier over there, then give him a good shove when he tried to get it back.

Blood rushed into Minty’s cheeks. That’s not true!

I done seen you with my own eyes from the cable car when it come down the hill. Everybody on the car seen you.

It may have looked like I pushed him, but I’ll take an oath on the Bible I didn’t.

You trying to tell me this feller took a Brodie on his own?

Brodie?

Brodie. Fall. He done fell down them steps like a drunk Irishman.

He wasn’t drunk. Minty gasped. Oh, he stopped breathing. You must help, now.

I reckon I will so’s you quit yapping about it. But he’s a goner. I seen lots of fellers dying in Lincoln’s War. The sheriff stepped onto the lowest railing.

Minty bent over, felt breath on her cheek. You are alive, Soldier Hanks.

Move away, gal.

A lobster’s claw clutched Minty’s shoulder. It was the sheriff’s right hand, red and missing two fingers, she realized. She smacked it away. Don’t touch me.

Whoa there, gal. Don’t go attacking a lawman. You’re in a heap of trouble already.

But—

Want me to take a look-see or not?

Minty stood and backed away, her gaze fixed on Cole’s wizened face.

Like I said, he’s a goner, Cole said.

I felt his breath.

Won’t be long now. The sheriff jerked the soldier onto his side, dragged the duffel out from under him, yanked the soldier’s coat loose, and let the soldier fall back.

He’s hurt. And it’s my fault.

Thought it was. The sheriff reached into one of the coat pockets.

That’s not what I meant. I didn’t push him. He fell. But maybe he wouldn’t have fallen if I hadn’t distracted him.

Whyn’t you just run along now, gal, afore I arrest you for murder?

You can’t arrest me. I didn’t push him. And I can’t leave the soldier. It wouldn’t be right.

Run along. You heared me.

What about him?

I’ll take care of the remains. He kicked the soldier’s side with a scuffed boot, and the soldier whined, though still unconscious.

He’s not dead, maybe not even dying, Minty said.

Skedaddle afore I make you sorry you didn’t. Consider yourself danged lucky I don’t haul you off to jail.

You have my brother’s watch and my handbag and portfolio.

It’s evidence. As he stepped toward her, he pushed back his coat to reveal a six-shooter. Git.

Please give me back my things, or at least Eddie’s watch.

He drew the gun. Git, I said.

Heedless of showing her bloomers, Minty flung herself up to the handrail and over it. The sheriff’s laughter chased her up the stairs. At the top, she looked back at the fallen soldier and the little sheriff pulling a shirt from the duffel bag as a cloud of dust swirled around them.

<> <> <>

Minty plodded along Pennsylvania Avenue in the Quality Hill neighborhood of Kansas City. She gave nary a glance at the houses, mostly red brick with gold painted trim or deep blue or jade green though once in a while she passed a home with a mansard roof in the French style like the Wilcoxes’ own or an eccentric Queen Anne with a porch here and a bay there.

Minty lifted her head and looked at the busts of Romeo and Juliet on either side of the front porch of the house across the street. Earlier they’d seemed to smile at her, urging her on her way to inquire at Corley and Son about the position for a stenographer/typist posted in the newspaper before Christmas. Now the romantic couple stared blindly into the wind-blown dust.

Minty passed those homes so eagerly, so confidently not long before, how long she didn’t know because she no longer had the watch her brother had loaned her.

She pressed her hand to her mouth. What will I tell Eddie? I should have made Cole return my things. But how? He had a gun. Maybe I should report the soldier’s fall to the police. But what if the sheriff has already reported me to the police? They’ll arrest me and take me to—

Miss Wilcox?

A man in a reddish-brown suit ran down the steps from Miss Agnes Shackleton’s porch as Miss Shackleton herself, as ever in black, vanished into her house. In ghostly gray, Miss Shackleton’s maid followed.

Yes?

The man stopped in front of Minty. He was bearded, but his complexion was young and so were his dark brown eyes. He carried a large Gladstone traveling bag and a black coat.

Who are you? Minty asked. How do you know my name? Oh, no, here you go again, Minty, talking to strangers on the street. Look where it led last time. Good day. Minty stepped forward past the man.

He jumped aside, dragged his hat off and bowed. I’m Daniel Price, Miss Wilcox. Forgive me for being so forward. I wrote the address down wrong, you see. He held out a slip of paper that bore 1070 Pennsylvania in bold, square letters.

I guess I see, if you meant to come to our house. Though why you would want to, I wouldn’t know.

Instead of clarifying that issue, the young man waved vaguely to his right. That lady up there?

Miss Shackleton?

His eyes sparkled. She doesn’t speak highly of the Wilcoxes.

She wouldn’t. Minty glanced at Miss Shackleton’s house, a vast white pile, not nearly as elegant as the Wilcox home, 1074 Pennsylvania, a four-story red brick with olive green trim. A mansard roof topped it and a porch jutted from the front of the main level. So why are you paying us a call, sir?

Minty gave the stranger a closer look. His suit was tweed and new. The collar of his white shirt was crisp, his necktie modest, his beard and mustache neatly trimmed.

I warn you, sir, Minty said. My mother doesn’t deal with itinerant salesmen.

I’ve come about the room.

The room?

There was an advertisement in the newspaper.

Mama had said not a word to Minty about taking in another boarder, but it wouldn’t do for her to let this stranger know that. Oh yes, that room. You’d best come along then.

With what she hoped was elegance, she swept past him and up the steps to the porch of 1074. She stopped in front of the heavy oak door while the man opened it for her. At the other end of the vestibule, she stopped while he opened the inner door as well. Do come in, Mr. Pierce. Let me call my mother.

It’s Price, Miss Wilcox. Daniel Price.

Oh yes, Mr. Price. Minty turned to her right once, then right again. She stopped by the small oak table against the wall that separated the vestibule from the front hall. She lifted her gaze to the mirror. Minty gasped. Sometime during the hectic morning, her small black hat with a deep-red rose below the brim had slipped off the top of her head and now perched on her right ear. Oh. Minty yanked out her hatpin, removed her hat, and dropped it on the green damask table cover. She smoothed her brown hair.

Minty! Minty!

In the mirror, Minty glimpsed a girl in a blue dress on the oak staircase, still garlanded with Christmas greenery. A black cat just ahead of the girl jumped off the next-to-the- bottom step, sprinted across the front hall and sprang onto the window seat while the girl teetered on the last step but three. Then the girl, Minty’s youngest sibling, jumped, sprawled on the floor, picked herself up, and danced from foot to foot, her blond curls and pink ribbons bouncing. It’s him, Minty. Miss Shackleton’s beau.

Miss Shackleton has a beau? the young man said. Surely not.

Yes, she does, too. And it’s you!

You think I’m Miss Shackleton’s beau? Interesting.

Come here, Peach. You look a sight. While the little girl gawked at the young man, Minty smoothed her sister’s blond curls.

I’m no one’s beau at the moment, but I know who you are.

You do?

You’re Miss Priscilla Wilcox. Mr. Price took Peach’s grubby hand and shook it. I’m very happy to make your acquaintance.

Peach pulled away. I’m Peach. That’s what Papa calls me and everybody else, too, ‘cause I’m Papa’s peach of a girl.

I can see that.

Hold still, Peach. Minty retied the pink ribbon on the right side of Peach’s head.

How did you know my name’s really Priscilla?

Miss Shackleton next door gave me the particulars of everyone in this household.

Huh? Peach said.

Minty tugged the blue skirt out of Peach’s drawers. She told him all about us apparently, but you know, Mr. Price, you shouldn’t listen to that old . . . to Miss Shackleton. She bears us many grudges for things we never did. But you probably want to speak with my mother about the room, Mr. Price, instead of hanging about the front hall all day . . . Peach? Where’s Mama?

I don’t—

Mama’s in the cellar helping Gerta with the wash, said Eddie, Minty’s youngest brother, as he limped into the front hall. Small for his age, he wore a starched white shirt, a gray vest, and gray trousers. He had narrow, foxy features and light brown hair. Who’s this? He stared through wire-rimmed spectacles. My mother doesn’t deal with men who sell door-to-door, sir.

You must be Master Edward.

It’s Mr. Edward Wilcox. I’ll be fourteen next month.

Mr. Wilcox. Price edged past Minty and Peach. He held out his hand.

Eddie, this is Mr. Daniel Price, Minty said. He’s come about a room Mama advertised in the newspaper.

Eddie shook hands with Price, but stood his ground.

I am impressed with your cautious nature, Mr. Wilcox. Let me show you my references, sir. Let’s see. Where are they?

Price folded his black coat inside out to reveal a black and dark green plaid lining and an Emery, Bird, Thayer label. Bold as brass for someone who didn’t yet know if he’d be accepted into the house as a lodger, he laid the coat on the armchair with green plush upholstery by the table and his hat on top of the coat. He dropped the valise on the Brussels carpet in front of the chair.

I think they’re in here, Price said. Kneeling, he rummaged in his bag and pulled out a pair of socks, rolled together. He dropped the socks back in the valise and drew out a white shirt, then put it back. Where can they be? Price splayed his hand across his bearded chin. I remember! He jumped up and pushed his hand into his jacket pocket. Not there. Ever faster, he patted his inside pockets, his vest pockets, large and small, his outside jacket pockets above and below, inside pockets, back trouser pockets, front trouser pockets.

Minty tapped her right foot.

Finally, Price put his hands on his hips. Peach, you little imp!

I’m not no imp.

Grammar, Peach, Minty said. Peach was the youngest member of the household, so everyone who lived at 1074 Pennsylvania except the cat corrected her. You need to say, I’m not an imp.

Well, I’m not no imp neither.

Peach!

Price reached behind Peach’s left ear and tousled her curls. Funny. I don’t feel any horns.

I don’t have horns!

Here it is. You had it all the time. Price held out a silver coin he’d apparently plucked from behind Peach’s ear.

I’m showing Mama. Peach grabbed the coin and skipped out of the room. The cat jumped down from the window seat and padded after.

Cheap parlor trick, said Eddie. Will you show me how to do it, Mr. Price?

Very impressive, Minty said. But if you’re in earnest about renting a room, you must present written credentials as well as your money, sir.

Price’s eyes gleamed as he pulled some papers from his jacket. He handed them to Minty. Will these do?

Minty unfolded the papers, good quality, she noted, and studied the letter on top. It’s a reference from Mr. John Hayes, the Chief of Police. Has Cole gone to the police? Minty wondered.

He’s my uncle’s friend.

Very good. Minty read the letter, which swore to the strength of Mr. Price’s character in a tone like that of Minty’s own letters of recommendation. She sighed when she thought about those letters that Sheriff Clayton Cole had taken, along with her purse and leather portfolio. I’ll have to get more letters of recommendation and redo