The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo Trilogy Bundle (87 page)

“All right,” Faste said. “According to Bubble the prosecutor wants to have a confession before they arrest anybody.”

Andersson said nothing. Listlessly they watched people moving through the neighbourhood.

At 4:40, Prosecutor Ekström called Faste's mobile.

“Things are happening. We found Bjurman shot in his apartment. He's been dead for at least twenty-four hours.”

Faste sat up in his seat. “Got it. What should we do?”

“I'm going to issue an alert on Salander. She's being sought as a suspect in three murders. We'll send it out county-wide. We have to consider her dangerous and very possibly armed.”

“Got it.”

“I'm sending a van to Lundagatan. They'll go in and secure the apartment.”

“Understood.”

“Have you been in touch with Bublanski?”

“He's at
Millennium.
”

“And seems to have turned off his phone. Could you try to reach him and let him know?”

Faste and Andersson looked at each other.

“The question is, what do we do if she turns up?” Andersson said.

“If she's alone and things look good, we'll pick her up. This girl is as crazy as hell and obviously on a killing spree. There may be more weapons in the apartment.”

Blomkvist was dead tired when he laid the pile of manuscript pages on Berger's desk and slumped into the chair by the window overlooking Götgatan. He had spent the whole afternoon trying to make up his mind what they ought to do with Svensson's unfinished book.

Svensson had been dead only a few hours, and already his publisher
was debating what to do with the work he had left behind. An outsider might think it cynical and coldhearted, but Blomkvist did not see it that way. He felt as if he were in an almost weightless state. It was a sensation that every reporter or newspaper editor knew well, and it kicked in at moments of direst crisis.

When other people are grieving, the newspaperman turns efficient. And despite the numbing shock that afflicted the members of the
Millennium
team who were there that Maundy Thursday morning, professionalism took over and was rigorously channelled into work.

For Blomkvist this went without saying. He and Svensson were two of a kind, and Svensson would have done the same himself if their roles had been reversed. He would have asked himself what he could do for Blomkvist. Svensson had left a legacy in the form of a manuscript with an explosive story. He had worked on it for four years; he had put his soul into a task which he would now never complete.

And he had chosen to work at
Millennium
.

The murders of Dag Svensson and Mia Johansson were not a national trauma on the scale of the murder of Olof Palme, and the investigation would not be minutely followed by a grieving nation. But for employees of
Millennium
the shock was perhaps greater—they were affected personally—and Svensson had a broad network of contacts in the media who were going to demand answers to their questions.

But now it was Blomkvist's and Berger's duty to finish Svensson's book, and to answer the questions Who killed them? And why?

“I can reconstruct the unfinished text,” Blomkvist said. “Malin and I have to go through the unedited chapters line by line and see where more work still needs to be done. For most of it, all we have to do is follow Dag's notes, but we do have a problem in chapters four and five, which are largely based on Mia's interviews. Dag didn't fill in who the sources were, but with one or two exceptions I think we can use the references in her thesis as a primary source.”

“What about the last chapter?”

“I have Dag's outline, and we talked it through so many times that I know more or less exactly what he wanted to say. I propose that we lift the summary and use it as an afterword, where I can also explain his reasoning.”

“Fair enough, but I want to approve it. We can't be putting words in his mouth.”

“No danger of that. I'll write the chapter as my personal reflection
and sign it. I'll describe how he came to write and research the book and say what sort of person he was. I'll conclude by recapping what he said in at least a dozen conversations over the past few months. There's plenty in his draft that I can quote. I think I can make it sound dignified.”

“I want this book published more than ever,” Berger said.

Blomkvist understood exactly what she meant.

Berger put her reading glasses on the desk and shook her head. She got up and poured two cups of coffee from the thermos and sat down opposite Blomkvist.

“Christer and I have a layout for the replacement issue. We've taken two articles earmarked for the issue after this one and we're going to fill the gaps with freelance material. But it'll be a bit of this and a bit of that, an issue without any real focus.”

They sat quietly for a moment.

“Have you listened to the news?” Berger asked.

“No. I know what they're going to say.”

“It's the top story on every radio station. The second-place story is a political move by the Centre Party.”

“Which means that absolutely nothing else is happening in the country.”

“The police haven't released their names yet. They're being described as a ‘conscientious couple.' No-one's mentioned that it was you who found them.”

“I'll bet the police will do all they can to keep it quiet. At least that's to our advantage.”

“Why would the police want to do that?”

“Because detectives basically hate a media circus. I would guess something will leak out sometime tonight or early tomorrow morning.”

“So young and so cynical.”

“We aren't that young anymore, Ricky. I thought about it while I was being questioned last night. The police inspector looked like she could still be at school.”

Berger gave a weak laugh. She had had a few hours' sleep last night, but she was beginning to feel the strain. Still, in no time at all she would be editor in chief of one of the largest newspapers in Sweden.
And no—this was not the right time to reveal that news to Blomkvist
.

“Henry called a while ago. A preliminary investigation leader named Ekström held some sort of press conference this afternoon.”

“Richard Ekström?”

“Yes. Do you know him?”

“Political flunky. Guaranteed media circus. This is going to get plenty of publicity.”

“Well, he says that the police are already following up certain leads and hope to solve the case soon. Otherwise he pretty much said nothing. But apparently the place was jammed with reporters.”

Blomkvist rubbed his eyes. “I can't get the image of Mia's body out of my mind. Damn, I was just getting to know them.”

“Some crazy—”

“I don't know. I've been thinking about it all day.”

“About what?”

“Mia was shot from the side. I saw the entry wound on the side of her neck and the exit wound in her forehead. Dag was shot from the front. The bullet went into his forehead, and came out the back of his head. Those looked to be the only two shots. It doesn't feel like the act of a lone nutcase.”

Berger looked at her partner thoughtfully. “So what was it?”

“If it's not a random killing, then there has to be a motive. And the more I think about it, the more it feels as if this manuscript provides a damned good motive.” Blomkvist gestured at the stack of paper on Berger's desk. She followed his eyes. Then they looked at each other. “Maybe it's not the book itself. Maybe they had done too much snooping and managed to … I don't know … maybe somebody felt threatened.”

“And hired a hit man. Micke—that's the stuff of American movies. This book is about the exploiters, the users. It names police officers, politicians, journalists … So you think one of them murdered Dag and Mia?”

“I don't know, Ricky. But we're supposed to be going to press in three weeks with the toughest exposé of trafficking that's ever been published in Sweden.”

At that moment Eriksson knocked and put her head round the door. An Inspector Bublanski wanted to speak with Blomkvist.

Bublanski shook hands with Berger and Blomkvist and sat down in the third chair at the table by the window. He studied Blomkvist and saw a hollow-eyed man with a day's growth of beard.

“Have there been any developments?” Blomkvist said.

“Maybe. I understand you were the one who found the couple in Enskede and called the police last night.”

Blomkvist nodded wearily.

“I know that you told your story to the detective on duty last night, but I wonder if you could clarify a few details for me.”

“What would you like to know?”

“How did you come to be driving over to see Svensson and Johansson so late at night?”

“That's not a detail, it's a whole novel,” Blomkvist said with a tired smile. “I was at a dinner party at my sister's house—she lives in a new development in Stäket. Dag Svensson called me on my mobile and said that he wasn't going to have time to come to the office on Thursday—today, that is—as we had previously agreed. He was supposed to deliver some photographs to our art director. The reason he gave was that he and Mia had decided to drive up to her parents' house over the weekend, and they wanted to leave early in the morning. He asked if it would be OK if he messengered them to me last night instead. I said that since I lived so close, I could pick up the photographs on my way home from my sister's.”

“So you drove to Enskede to pick up photographs.”

“Yes.”

“Can you think of any motive for the murders of Svensson and Johansson?”

Blomkvist and Berger glanced at each other. Neither said a word.

“What is it?” Bublanski wanted to know.

“We've discussed the matter today and we're having a bit of a disagreement. Well, actually not a disagreement—we're just not certain. We would rather not speculate.”

“Tell me.”

Blomkvist described to him the subject of Svensson's book, and how he and Berger had been discussing whether it might have some connection to the murders. Bublanski sat quietly for a moment, digesting the information.

“So Dag Svensson was about to expose police officers.”

He did not at all like the turn the conversation had taken, and imagined how a “police trail” might wander back and forth in the media and give rise to all kinds of conspiracy theories.

“No,” Blomkvist said. “He was about to expose criminals, a few of whom happen to be police officers. There are also one or two members of my own profession, namely journalists.”

“And you're thinking of publishing this information now?”

Blomkvist turned to look at Berger.

“No,” she said. “We've spent the day working on the next issue. In all probability we'll publish Svensson's book, but that won't happen until we know exactly what's going on. In light of what has happened, the book will have to be extensively reworked. We will do nothing to sabotage the investigation into the murder of our two friends, if that's what you're worried about.”

“I'll have to take a look at Svensson's desk, but since these are the editorial offices of a magazine it might be a sensitive thing to put in hand a complete search.”

“You'll find all Dag's material in his laptop,” Berger said.

“I've gone through his desk,” Blomkvist said. “I've taken some documents that directly identify sources who want to remain anonymous. You are at liberty to examine everything else, and I've put a note on the desk to the effect that nothing may be touched or moved. The problem is that the contents of the book absolutely have to remain under wraps until it's printed. We badly need to avoid having the text passed around the police force, the more so since we're going to hang one or two policemen out to dry.”

Shit
, Bublanski thought.
Why didn't I come straight here this morning
? But he only nodded and changed tack.

“OK. We have a person we want to question in connection with the murders. I believe it's someone you know. I'd like to hear what you have to say about a woman named Lisbeth Salander.”

For a second Blomkvist looked like a virtual question mark. Bublanski noted that Berger gave her colleague a sharp look.

“Now I don't understand.”

“You know Lisbeth Salander?”

“Yes, I do know her.”

“How do you know her?”

“Why do you ask?”

Bublanski was obviously irritated, but all he said was, “I'd like to interview her in connection with the murders. How do you know her?”

“But … that doesn't make sense. Lisbeth Salander has no connection whatsoever to Dag Svensson or Mia Johansson.”

“That's something we'll establish in due course,” Bublanski said patiently. “But my question remains. How do you know Lisbeth Salander?”

Blomkvist stroked the stubble on his chin and then rubbed his eyes as thoughts tumbled around in his head. At last he met Bublanski's gaze.

“I hired her about two years ago to do some research for me on a completely different project.”

“What was that project?”

“I'm sorry, but now you'll have to take my word for it: it didn't have the slightest thing to do with Dag Svensson or Mia Johansson. And it's all over.”

Bublanski did not like it when someone claimed there were matters that could not be discussed even in a murder investigation, but he chose to drop it for the time being.

“When was the last time you saw Salander?”

Blomkvist paused before he spoke.

“Here's how it is. During the autumn two years ago I was seeing her. The relationship ended around Christmas of that year. Then she disappeared from the city. I hadn't seen her for more than a year until a week ago.”

Berger raised her eyebrows. Bublanski surmised that this was news to her.