Stieg Larsson: The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest

“That petty thief you identified…”

“Kenneth Gustafsson, forty-four, dealer, and delinquent in his youth. Offhand I would guess it’s to do with an internal shake-up of some sort. Svavelsjö M.C. is mixed up in several kinds of criminal activity, including the distribution of methamphetamine. Nykvarn may be a cemetery in the woods for people who crossed them, but…”

“Yes?”

“This young prostitute who was murdered in Södertälje… her name is Irina Petrova. The autopsy revealed that she died as a result of a staggeringly vicious assault. She looked as if she had been beaten to death. But the actual cause of her injuries could not be established. Blomkvist made a pretty acute observation. Petrova had injuries that could very well have been inflicted by a man’s bare hands…”

“Niedermann?”

“It’s a reasonable assumption. But there’s no proof yet.”

“So how do we proceed?” Spångberg wondered.

“I have to confer with Bublanski,” Modig said. “But a logical step would be to interrogate Zalachenko. We’re interested in hearing what he has to say about the murders in Stockholm, and for you it’s a matter of finding out what was Niedermann’s role in Zalachenko’s business. He might even be able to point you in the direction of Niedermann.”

One of the detectives from Göteborg said: “What have we found at the farm in Gosseberga?”

“We found four revolvers. A Sig Sauer that had been dismantled and was being oiled on the kitchen table. A Polish P-83 Wanad on the floor next to the bench in the kitchen. A Colt 1911 Government – that’s the pistol that Blomkvist tried to hand in to Paulsson. And finally a.22 calibre Browning, which is pretty much a toy gun alongside the others. We rather think that it was the weapon used to shoot Salander, given that she’s still alive with a slug in her brain.”

“Anything else?”

“We found and confiscated a bag containing about 200,000 kronor. It was in an upstairs room used by Niedermann.”

“How do you know it was his room?”

“Well, he does wear a size XXL. Zalachenko is at most a medium.”

“Do you have anything on Zalachenko or Bodin in your records?” Holmberg said.

Erlander shook his head.

“Of course it depends on how we interpret the confiscated weapons. Apart from the more sophisticated weaponry and an unusually sophisticated T.V. surveillance of the farm, we found nothing to distinguish it from any other farmhouse. The house itself is spartan, no frills.”

Just before noon there was a knock on the door and a uniformed officer delivered a document to Spångberg.

“We’ve received a call,” she said, “about a missing person in Alingsås. A dental nurse by the name of Anita Kaspersson left her home by car at 7.30 this morning. She took her child to day care and should have arrived at her place of work by 8.00. But she never did. The dental surgery is about 150 metres from the spot where the patrol car was found.”

Erlander and Modig both looked at their wristwatches.

“Then he has a four-hour head start. What kind of car is it?”

“A dark-blue 1991 Renault. Here’s the registration number.”

“Send out an A.P.B. on the vehicle at once. He could be in Oslo by now, or Malmö, or maybe even Stockholm.”

They brought the conference to a close by deciding that Modig and Erlander would together interrogate Zalachenko.

Cortez frowned and followed Berger with his gaze as she cut across the hall from her office to the kitchenette. She returned moments later with a cup of coffee, went back into her office and closed the door.

Cortez could not put his finger on what was wrong. Millennium was the kind of small office where co-workers were close. He had worked part-time at the magazine for four years, and during that time the team had weathered some phenomenal storms, especially during the period when Blomkvist was serving a three-month sentence for libel and the magazine almost went under. Then their colleague Dag Svensson was murdered, and his girlfriend too.

Through all these storms Berger had been the rock that nothing seemed capable of shifting. He was not surprised that she had called to wake him early that morning and put him and Lottie Karim to work. The Salander affair had cracked wide open, and Blomkvist had got himself somehow involved in the killing of a policeman in Göteborg. So far, everything was under control. Karim had parked herself at police headquarters and was doing her best to get some solid information out of someone. Cortez had spent the morning making calls, piecing together what had happened overnight. Blomkvist was not answering his telephone, but from a number of sources Cortez had a fairly clear picture of the events of the night before.

Berger, on the other hand, had been distracted all morning. It was rare for her to close the door to her office. That usually happened only when she had a visitor or was working intently on some problem. This morning she had not had a single visitor, and she was not – so far as he could judge – working. On several occasions when he had knocked on the door to relay some news, he had found her sitting in the chair by the window. She seemed lost in thought, as listlessly she watched the stream of people walking down below on Götgatan. She had paid scant attention to his reports.

Something was wrong.

The doorbell interrupted his ruminations. He went to open it and found the lawyer Annika Giannini. Cortez had met Blomkvist’s sister a few times, but he did not know her well.

“Hello, Annika,” he said. “Mikael isn’t here today.”

“I know. I want to talk to Erika.”

Berger barely looked up from her position by the window, but she quickly pulled herself together when she saw who it was.

“Hello,” she said. “Mikael isn’t here today.”

Giannini smiled. “I know. I’m here for Björck’s Säpo report. Micke asked me to take a look at it in case it turns out that I represent Salander.”

Berger nodded. She got up, took a folder from her desk and handed it to Giannini.

Giannini hesitated a moment, wondering whether to leave the office. Then she made up her mind and, uninvited, sat down opposite Berger.

“O.K… what’s going on with you?”

“I’m about to resign from Millennium , and I haven’t been able to tell Mikael. He’s been so tied up in this Salander mess that there hasn’t been the right opportunity, and I can’t tell the others before I tell him. Right now I just feel like shit.”

Giannini bit her lower lip. “So you’re telling me instead. Why are you leaving?”

“I’m going to be editor-in-chief of Svenska Morgon-Posten .”

“Jesus. Well, in that case, congratulations seem to be in order rather than any weeping or gnashing of teeth.”

“Annika… this isn’t the way I had planned to end my time at Millennium . In the middle of bloody chaos. But the offer came like a bolt from the blue, and I can’t say no. I mean… it’s the chance of a lifetime. But I got the offer just before Dag and Mia were shot, and there’s been such turmoil here that I buried it. And now I have the world’s worst guilty conscience.”

“I understand. But now you’re afraid of telling Micke.”

“It’s an utter disaster. I haven’t told anybody. I thought I wouldn’t be starting at S.M.P . until after the summer, and that there would still be time to tell everyone. But now they want me to start asap.”

She fell silent and stared at Annika. She looked on the verge of tears.

“This is, in point of fact, my last week at Millennium . Next week I’ll be on a trip, and then… I need about a fortnight off to recharge my batteries. I start at S.M.P . on the first of May.”