A Fate Worse
than Death, or
Whatever Happened to Len and Brenda Hubbard's Kids?
by Nancy Kaminski
(c) February 1998
It was a dark and stormy night
when Len finally returned home to Black Harbour from Toronto.
Flakes of snow blew in the door as he hurried to get over the
threshold into the warmth and safety of his house. He stomped
the snow off his shoes and began peeling off his anorak.
Brenda rushed to his side. "Oh,
Len!" she exclaimed, embracing him. "Oh God, I was
so worried about you. Did he give you any trouble?" The
'he,' of course, referred to Dan Christos, the sinister fence
who had entangled Len in his shady affairs and now refused to
let him go.
"Nah, although it took some
convincing him to let me go to Toronto," Len replied, as
he headed for the Scotch bottle. "I think he sent some goon
to follow me, though. Suspicious bastard." He poured a healthy
slug in a tumbler and sat heavily on the sofa. He heaved a deep
sigh. "Brenda, I found them."
Apprehensive, Brenda sat beside
him and, taking the glass out of his hand, downed a mouthful
of the fiery liquor herself. She steeled herself for the newswhere
had their two teenage daughters gone? "Tell me."
"Well," he started,
"You know how they went to that youth conference that Andy
pushed, right? Meeting in that swank hotel on Queen Street? Seems
they met up with some preacher guy in that plaza in front of
City Hallthe place with the big fountain, eh?and
well, joined up with him."
"Oh, no, Len, not a cult?"
She was horrified. Visions of her two sweet girls, just seventeen
and eighteen years old, turned into fundamentalist zombies waiting
for flying saucers filled her head. That was the sort of thing
that could happen to Kathy and Nick's girlsafter all, they
had been born and raised in LA, where cults were an everyday
thingbut not here, not to girls from Black Harbour. Never.
Len was nodding his head slowly.
"Yeah, a cult. Those Hare Krishna guys, that wear the orange
robes, shave their heads, and go around selling flowers at the
airport and in shopping malls. There's a big temple there up
on Avenue Road or thereabouts, used to be a church, you know,
but now it's some kind of a Krishna temple."
Brenda wiped her eyes and tried
to think clearly. "Well, that's not so bad, is it? I hear
they're good, gentle people who don't do any harm. It's just
different, is all. Right?"
Len said sadly, "They changed
their names. Now it's Aruna and Chakri. No more Francine and
Elizabeth."
They clung together for comfort.
It was unbelievable, that it could happen to their little family.
Finally Brenda drew back and examined Len's face. He had that
set look, the withdrawn eyes, that meant he was hiding something.
Brenda had become all too familiar with it in recent months.
"Len, there's more, isn't
there?"
He didn't answer.
"Len, tell me!" She
shook him. "You agreed, no more secrets! Tell meare
they into drugs? Are they selling themselves? What? How can it
be more horrible than this?"
Moments passed in silence. Len
got up, refilled his glass with more Scotch, and downed most
of it in one swallow. Brenda followed him with her eyes, silently
pleading for the truth, no matter how hard it would be to take.
The things that had happened to their entire familyKathy
and Nick's breakup, Frances' death, Len's infidelity, the whole
deal with the struggle over the boatyard, and getting the wharf
out of the clutches of that SOB Walter Veinot, and scraping together
funds to run the Grillhad toughened her. She could take
it.
Finally, Len sat down again and
took her hand. "I saw them. On Yonge Street, outside the
Eaton Centre, you know, where the buskers perform?"
"What, were they selling
flowers?"
Len started crying, tears sliding
silently down his face. "No, they weren't selling flowers.
There they were, in those stupid orange robes, their heads shaved
"
He stopped, his breath coming in sobs.
"WHAT?" Brenda screamed
in an agony of suspense. "What were they doing?!?"
He hid his face in his hands.
"They're mimes."
Finis
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