`What about you?' Davey slid the picture over to Gary.
The barman glanced at the photo but didn't pick it up.
`Mate, we get so many girls in here. They come and go, know what I mean? Can't remember 'em all.'
`And definitely not this one?' Davey persisted.
`Not as many redheads, I gotta admit,' he mused.
`What about this man?' Davey asked, pulling out the photo of Kransky.
The barman made a noise of protest and spread his palms in front of him.
`Mate, asking me to remember the girls' faces is hard enough, don't even start me with the blokes! Although,' a sneer spread across his lips as he indicated the photo, `we do try to keep the ugly ones out.'
He laughed and moved off to serve customers and Davey turned away.
`If Pixie shows up I'll tell her to look out for you,' drawled the dark haired woman. She muttered something under her breath and the blonde giggled.
Archie was polishing off a second pot when Davey returned to the booth.
`Any joy?'
Davey shrugged and took a swig of flat beer. `Might come back later and give the blonde another nudge.'
Archie burped loudly and clasped his left side. `Don't waste your time, son.'
CHAPTER SIX
At ten thirty on Sunday morning the main drag in Lorne was like Bourke Street. Make that Chapel Street, South Yarra, Decca decided: Planet Blonde. There were no council signs declaring this a `No Fat Chicks' zone; it was an unwritten law. Healthy, middle-class, white people with tans that testified to the judicious use of sun-block and being `on hols since Chrissy', spilled out of cafés and ice-creameries and on to footpaths packed five deep.
There were guys and gals in expensively ripped surf gear, sporting bleary eyes from too much ecky and Boags the night before; Nike-clad mavens jogging behind three-wheeled strollers like demented rickshaw drivers on speed; buffed teen goddesses with washboard stomachs you could play a jug-band solo on with the crown jewels dangling from their belly-buttons; lavender grandmothers with toddlers in designer gear, off for a baby-cino while Mummy and Daddy enjoyed a quiet brunch. Not a derro, wino or busker in sight.
Decca couldn't wait to get out of there.
While winding her way back past Hutt Gully along the road to Anglesea, thoughts about Oleg Kransky crowded in her mind. Decca considered herself a shrewd judge of character but she hadn't been challenged by a question of murder before.
She meant it when she said that Oleg loved Inga, but did that necessarily mean he hadn't killed her. It was a statistical fact that most murders were committed by a member of the victim's immediate family or at least by someone known to them. More often than not the murderer was someone they loved or who loved them. Love was no defence; it was a red rag to a bull.
And there was a bull-like quality to Oleg, she remembered. Short and muscular with the sort of dark, deep-set, scowling eyes that loomed out from grainy, black and white photos of concentration camp survivors. A craggy face, that's how Decca would have described it. A downturned mouth with small, uneven teeth glimpsed rarely in nervous smiles. He had a habit of vigorously rubbing his chin with the palm of his hand on one side then the back of the hand on the other. He was ill at ease in a chair and was forever crossing and re-crossing his legs. Decca had her work cut out getting him to relax.
At the Torquay roundabout Decca took the left fork. With the coastline rapidly disappearing in her rear-view mirrors she cruised through farmlands that were airbrushed green courtesy of last Thursday's deluge. As the road straightened out, Decca recalled Oleg's first visit. He had shuffled through the door and stopped dead in his tracks.
`You are doctor?' he had asked, in a startled tone.
`Decca Brand,' she said extending her hand and indicating the armchair. `Were you expecting someone else?'
He'd looked from side to side as if doing just that. Rubbing his chin in what would become a familiar manner he'd taken a step forward, stopped, then taken a step back.
`Come in, sit down,' Decca had coaxed, seating herself in the armchair opposite.
It had taken her new client a full two minutes to decide whether to move or not, but Decca was not unduly bothered: everyone presented differently at their first session. It was not until many weeks later that she'd understood how unsettled he was by the fact that she was a woman.
`Tell me why you're here,' she'd said when he'd finally sat down and crossed his legs so tightly she feared for his circulation.
He worked for a re-blocking and stumping company, he'd explained. It wasn't what he was used to but there wasn't a lot of choice for a recent arrival with a limited grasp of the language. The panic attacks would come on out of the blue, Oleg had told her. He would be working steadily then suddenly, for no reason, his heart would speed up like he was scared. He would start sweating, feel as if he couldn't breathe, and as if he was going to have a heart attack and die.
Decca had suggested to him that there were some quite real dangers associated with the kind of work he did. In the last year alone she'd read of a case where an entire house had collapsed and killed a man working beneath it. It was okay to feel a little scared, she'd said. Crawling under houses didn't suit everyone.
Oleg had agreed that there were a lot of cowboys working in the business, but he believed the firm he worked for was reputable. He wasn't afraid of a house falling on him, he'd said, he was just afraid, full stop. Sometimes, in fact, he would get an attack when he was doing something quite simple, like plastering or rehanging a door.
`It only happens at work?' she'd asked.
He'd crossed and re-crossed his legs. `Yes.'
`Tell me a little about yourself, Oleg,' she'd said. It was as if she had asked him to explain Einstein's theory of relativity, his expression was so vexed. `What work did you do before?'
`I need something to fix my trouble!' he'd said, leaning forward and tapping his head. `I must work.'
`Why?' Decca had asked. This deceptively simple question often achieved spectacular results.
`Why?' he'd cried, leaping to his feet. `Why? I must make money! I must buy food, clothes. I must take care of my wife!'
`Have you been married for long?' she asked in an even tone.
`Oh, yes,' he said. `Long, long time. Over there,' he gestured with his hand and a jerk of his head.
`Have you been here for long?' Decca had asked.
`I am here for months,' he said.
Decca hadn't been sure if he'd meant `for' or `four', but she didn't want to stop him while he was opening up.
`She is here…' Oleg hesitated, `first.'
So, they came to Australia separately, she'd noted, deciding not to press him on that either.
`Are you happy together?' she asked.
He'd given her that Einstein look again, but with an agonised edge which may have been due to language difficulties or because an answer was beyond him. She'd discovered his many no-go areas — `What were your parents like? What was your life like before you came to Australia?' Even the simple `Do you and Inga have children?' — would trigger a shutdown. Consequently, large portions of their sessions were spent in a silence that was not meditation.
He never stopped asking her for drugs. He refused to keep a notebook and found it difficult to get his head around the cognitive exercises Decca suggested as a means of controlling the attacks.
He'd continued with the therapy for a while, however, and Decca continued hacking away at the granite façade, trying to unlock the controls. But despite Decca's best efforts Oleg Kransky had remained a cypher.
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