by Frank Perry
let’s go see.” As law officers, they usually approached suspicious scenes armed, but today they were civilians. Jim did have a Glock in his glove compartment, but it stayed locked.
As they neared the large opening, Jim yelled, “Hello, in the barn.”
With no reply, they moved to the opening, but it was difficult to see much before their eyes adjusted. A silver sedan was visible through cracks in the sideboards. It was parked out of sight from the road. Kiki yelled, “Hello, is anyone in here?” There weren’t any other doors, and the few windows had all become inoperable over the years. There was only one way in or out.
There was movement to their right, near the front wall, about twenty feet from them. A man showed himself, “Ah, hi.”
Kiki said, “I’m Carmen Joyce. I used to live here.”
The man seemed nervous, “I’m Jason Albrecht, my mother owns this place.”
They were both startled. Jim asked seriously, “Is that a fact? That’s been a bit of a mystery around her since Ms. Joyce’s father past away.”
The man was younger, probably late thirties. He wore a short sleeved cotton print shirt and Levi’s over his lean frame. He had handsome features with short brown hair, high cheekbones and cleft chin. “Well, ah, glad to meet you.” He shook Kiki’s hand but there was some undefinable hesitancy. Was he hiding something?
She introduced Jim, but neglected to say he was with the sheriff’s office. Neither of them was there officially. “Well, Jason, this is a surprise. We heard there was another person claiming to be the owner, but there doesn’t seem to be any record. I grew up here, and my father lived here until he died. I always thought he owned the property.”
“Well, Ms. Joyce, there might be some room for interpretation. My mother is from the original family that owned it before, and there wasn’t ever a formal transfer of the titles that we know of. It’s all kind of confused.”
“What does she intend to do?”
He answered cautiously, “I don’t think she wants a fight over it, if that’s what you mean. We know there’s some claim to the property by your family since they worked on the land for almost forty years and paid taxes and probably improved the place, although I don’t see much evidence of that now.”
He didn’t seem guarded or hostile at all. It was confusing to both of them. This man, Jason, seemed to be reasonable to deal with, but he wasn’t the actual owner according to him. She said, “There’s probably some legal ways to determine who really owns it or how it could be shared, but there’s also a lot of bills to be paid and I was planning to sell the property to pay them.”
He responded, “Well, selling it might be a problem for my mother.”
Jim interjected, “Can we talk to her about it?”
“I don’t know, sir. I can ask. I don’t think she wants to be real public about this.”
Kike interjected, “Well, can’t we at least talk to her about it?”
“I don’t know; I’ll ask.
Sibley
She was born in an upstairs bedroom in 1946, only a year after her father returned from serving in WWII with his new wife from San Diego. Carter Albrecht had had a rough childhood. His father was a convicted murderer, and Carter spent his teenage years isolated on his parent’s farm under self-imposed exile from other kids. He avoided contact with others his own age. As a Marine in the Pacific, he made lifelong friends from different parts of the country, none that knew him as the son of a murderer. Throughout the rest of his life, he cherished those friends, keeping track of marriages, birthdays, children, grandchildren and other important dates. It meant more to him than average people, because he had no friends at home. Over the years, other farmers would stop on the road or come in to chat, but they were never friends, Carter never went to meetings at the Grange. After the road was paved and enlarged to four lanes, a truck stop was built only one mile from his farm where everyone could buy diesel for their equipment. Carter bought fuel, but didn’t join his neighbors who started having coffee at the restaurant after morning chores, discussing the weather and farm prices, and probably gossiping. He remained a loner around the county, but corresponded with his Marine friends throughout their lives. The farm thrived throughout the fifties and sixties, but most of the profits had gone to medical bills for his young wife who died from cancer that lasted until Sibley was almost ten. The girl and her mother were together in her mother’s bedroom whenever she wasn’t away at school or helping run the farm. She learned to do the books for her father.
When Sibley’s mother died, her grandmother, Carter’s mother, became her surrogate mother. Her Grandma lived with them, and they had always been close. The older woman helped Sibley deal with her sadness throughout her mother’s ordeal, especially in the end when her mother suffered greatly. The doctors had kept increasing the doses of morphine that Sibley learned to inject; and in the end, her mother was so medicated that she seldom recognized anyone. Her dosages became so high and frequent that it would have been impossible to know what ultimately caused her death.
Carter was heartbroken and grieved deeply for weeks. His wife had been his only friend, his lover, his counselor, his inspiration to make the farm successful. If it hadn’t been for Sibley, he wouldn’t have wanted to live any longer. He’d been tormented for over thirty years and on the verge of committing suicide many times, but his wife always brought him back. A piece of her lived on in Sibley; she became his reason to live on.
Sibley’s grandmother took over motherly duties and raised her like the daughter she’d never had. Sibley went to private boarding school. Her father wanted her to have a quality education away from other children in their area. Mostly it was to shield her from the brutality of kids whose parents told them about her grandfather. He’d suffered from the time he was twelve and wanted to spare her the experience. By the time she entered high school, she started hearing things. Boys would see her in the yard and stop on their bicycles, trying to court the young beauty, but just as quickly stopped coming after their parents scolded them. One captivated young man resisted his parents for several weeks, meeting with Sibley secretly; but when he said her grandfather had murdered a man, she recoiled, not believing a word. She’d never known the family history. That was when her grandmother sat with her in the living room without Carter and told her the whole story from the beginning. It was complicated with secrets that would harm the family if discovered.
Sibley stopped dating boys from the area after that, and they gradually stopped coming by. She was never going to be able to leave the farm. It wasn’t only because of its secrets; she loved it and wanted to help her father. She’d learned too much about his past to ever leave him alone. Her grandmother felt obligated to tell Sibley the whole ugly truth, holding nothing back. If the girl was ever going to have a normal life, she needed to know everything, even the deep family secrets that nobody suspected; secrets that could ruin life for them all.
Kiki’s meeting of Jason Albrecht had been a lucky coincidence. The man didn’t really want to talk, but was forthcoming after Jim and Kiki proved they didn’t bite. Kiki was leaving the next day, so Jim agreed to keep in contact with Jason until his mother agreed to meet. They never disclosed their professions; it was irrelevant.
Carter
There didn’t seem any way for Sarah and her son to survive after losing John. He was the man-force at the farm, and it would be some years before the trees were mature enough to yield a good living for them. Their first chance at a minimal crop was one full season away. They needed help to survive.
Carter was twelve year old, but felt the necessity to be older. He had to grow up fast watching a man get shot and then having his father executed for murder. He was just a boy but told his mother that he would make the farm work. She didn’t know how, but she trusted his new determination. She admired his courage, something learned from his father. The barn was stacked with crates taken from the granary, things that Hicks
had stolen. One of the last things John told Carter, on the eve of his execution, was to hide it forever. He’d realized too late what a mistake in had been to get Carter involved, moving everything to their farm. It implicated Carter in a crime, maybe even murder; the boy had to put it where it would never be found, never.
The problem was the size and weight of everything. It was like trying to hide a railroad car. The stash covered the whole floor of the barn, and it was unnatural to leave the door closed. Someone investigating their property could peek through cracks in the siding or just open the door. They needed something secure, hidden from sight. They needed one of the new metal equipment sheds that farmers were installing after abandoning their obsolete barns. Mechanization and co-op farm organizations were making the original purpose of barns obsolete. The metal equipment buildings could be put up in a few days, coming mostly assembled on large flatbed trucks. In the 1920s, successful farms were using them and leaving the old barns to rot. They were weather tight and could be locked securely to protect the motorized equipment farmers were beginning to buy. The Albrecht barn door still slid closed, but it weighted almost a ton and wasn’t originally designed to be opened and shut daily, only during
