Another take:
Beverly Hyles Has Died
Beverly Hyles has died. I?m probably the last person to find out. She was a wretched woman who found herself in an ironclad marriage to a sex and power driven man whose theology and ethics had more in common with Frederick Nietszsche than to Jesus Christ. But she stayed married to him, never uttering a peep as stories of colleagues and subordinates taking sexual advantage of teenagers and young co-eds increased, even as her own son engineered beatings of outsiders among the boys and began to rack up his own impressive roll call of girls he seduced and dumped.
Beverly Hyles found refuge in the public image of the meek and submissive woman who would never question or disagree with her husband. Being a Quisling against the innocent became the crowning virtue of women at First Baptist Church of Hammond, indeed among all Fundamental Baptists, as all the women married to the first string preachers saw the depravity, watched young lives be destroyed, and obediently, submissively, kept their mouths closed. Submission became more important than charity, compassion, personal integrity, courage, or honor.
Paula Polonco, first wife of Dave Hyles, was a rare and brave woman who broke free, divorced him, and got the children away from their violent, wrathful, and sex-obsessed father. The Hyles family dumped both her and the children, and there was Bev, smiling sweetly, never intervening, never disagreeing with her husband. Like all who dissented from the Hyles machine, the grand children were simply erased from family and church memory.
Brent Stephens, the 18 month old son of David?s lover turned wife, died in mysterious and horrifying condition. Jack Hyles was at the scene before the cops got there. Dave pleaded the fifth ammendment at the inquest. The church attacked the lead investigator, Paul Ciolino, who never budged an inch from his certainty that Dave had played a hand in the abused child?s death. And Bev just stood there, silent and submissive, sweetly smiling.
Then Jack David, Dave?s own son, died in a bizarre accident. Dave flew his dad Jack Hyles down to the scene where it occurred. How did Jack David really die? And who was really there when he was run over in the driveway? Did Bev know? Did she suspect? She just stood silent and submissive, sweetly smiling.
And when Jack died, she just rolled away from Hammond with several million dollars and a sports car, heading for Texas, and never looked back. But she never spoke, never said all she knew. A couple years ago, when she was going to attend some conference or another, she cancelled because word got out that women were going to be there who were going to ask her some hard questions. Not Bev. Never. She perfected that saintly, benevolent smile her whole life. Lives around her were destroyed. Children died in mysterious circumstances, marriages were broken, dissenters roughed up. But Bev knew better than to be silenced by her husband or his cronies. She silenced herself. And she got the money and the car and a new house in Texas and a new life. All she ever had to do was keep her mouth shut and smile sweetly.
As somebody wrote in tribute to her on an obituary website: ?Now you are in God?s Hands. I am so happy.?
Me too.
