The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (Millennium 3)

She thought about that. "The first time I heard the name Ronald Niedermann was last Thursday. I tracked him to Gosseberga. I have no idea where he is or where he might go, but he'll try to get out of the country as soon as he can."

"Why would he flee abroad?"

Salander thought about it. "Because while Niedermann was out digging a grave for me, Zalachenko told me that things were getting too hot and that it had already been decided that Niedermann should leave the country for a while."

Salander had not exchanged this many words with a police officer since she was twelve.

"Zalachenko . . . so that's your father?"

Well, at least they've worked that one out. Probably thanks to Kalle Fucking Blomkvist.

"I have to tell you that your father has made a formal accusation to the police stating that you tried to murder him. The case is now at the prosecutor's office, and he has to decide whether to bring charges. But you have already been placed under arrest on a charge of aggravated assault, for having struck Zalachenko on the head with an axe."

There was a long silence. Then Modig leaned forward and said in a low voice, "I just want to say that we on the police force don't put much faith in Zalachenko's story. Have a serious discussion with your lawyer so we can come back later and have another talk."

The detectives stood up.

"Thanks for the help with Niedermann," Erlander said.

Salander was surprised that the officers had treated her in such a professional, almost friendly manner. She thought about what the Modig woman had said. There had to be some ulterior motive, she decided.

CHAPTER 7

Monday, April 11-Tuesday, April 12

At 5:45 p.m. on Monday, Blomkvist closed the lid on his iBook and got up from the kitchen table in his apartment on Bellmansgatan. He put on a jacket and walked to Milton Security's offices in Slussen. He took the elevator up to the reception on the fourth floor and was immediately shown into a conference room. It was 6:00 p.m. on the dot, but he was the last to arrive.

"Hello, Dragan," he said and shook hands. "Thank you for being willing to host this informal meeting."

Blomkvist looked around the room. There were four others there: his sister, Salander's former guardian Holger Palmgren, Malin Eriksson, and former criminal inspector Sonny Bohman, who now worked for Milton Security. At Armansky's instruction Bohman had been following the Salander investigation from the start.

Palmgren was on his first outing in more than two years. Dr. Sivarnandan of the Ersta rehabilitation home had been less than enchanted at the idea of letting him out, but Palmgren himself had insisted. He had come by special transport for the disabled, accompanied by his personal assistant and trainer, Johanna Karolina Oskarsson, whose salary was paid from a fund that had been mysteriously established to provide Palmgren with the best possible care. Oskarsson was sitting in an office next to the conference room. She had brought a book with her. Blomkvist closed the door behind him.

"For those of you who haven't met her before, this is Malin Eriksson, Millennium's editor in chief. I asked her to be here because what we're going to discuss will also affect her job."

"OK," Armansky said. "Everyone's here. I'm all ears."

Blomkvist stood at Armansky's whiteboard and picked up a marker. He looked around.

"This is probably the craziest thing I've ever been involved with," he said. "When this is all over I'm going to found an association called 'The Knights of the Idiotic Table,' and its purpose will be to arrange an annual dinner where we tell stories about Lisbeth Salander. You're all members."

He paused.

"So, this is how things really are," he said, and he began to make a list of headings on Armansky's whiteboard. He talked for a good thirty minutes. Afterwards, the discussion went on for almost three hours.

Gullberg sat down next to Clinton when their meeting was over. They spoke in low voices for a few minutes before Gullberg stood up. The old comrades shook hands.

Gullberg took a taxi to Freys, packed his briefcase, and checked out. He took the late-afternoon train to Goteborg. He chose first class and had the compartment to himself. When he passed Arstabron he took out a ballpoint pen and a notepad. He thought for a long while and then began to write. He filled half a page before he stopped and tore the sheet off the pad.

Forged documents had never been his department or his expertise, but here the task was simplified by the fact that the letters he was writing would be signed by him. What complicated the issue was that not a word of what he was writing was true.

By the time the train went through Nykoping he had already discarded a number of drafts, but he was starting to get a sense for how the letters should be phrased. When they arrived in Goteborg he had twelve letters he was satisfied with. He made sure he had left clear fingerprints on each sheet.

At Goteborg Central Station he tracked down a photocopier and made copies of the letters. Then he bought envelopes and stamps and posted the letters in a box with a 9:00 p.m. collection.

Gullberg took a taxi to City Hotel on Lorensbergsgatan, where Clinton had already booked a room for him. It was the same hotel Blomkvist had spent the night in several days before. He went straight to his room and sat on the bed. He was completely exhausted and realized that he had eaten only two slices of bread all day. Yet he was not hungry. He undressed, stretched out in bed, and fell asleep almost at once.

*

Salander woke with a start when she heard the door open. She knew right away that it was not one of the night nurses. She opened her eyes to two narrow slits and saw a silhouette with crutches in the doorway. Zalachenko was watching her in the light that came from the corridor.

Without moving her head she glanced at the digital clock: 3:10 a.m.

She then glanced at the bedside table and saw the water glass. She calculated the distance. She could just reach it without having to move her body.

It would take a few seconds to stretch out her arm and break off the rim of the glass with a firm rap against the hard edge of the table. It would take half a second to shove the broken edge into Zalachenko's throat if he leaned over her. She looked for other options, but the glass was her only reachable weapon.

She relaxed and waited.

Zalachenko stood in the doorway for two minutes without moving. Then gingerly he closed the door.

She heard the faint scraping of the crutches as he quietly retreated down the corridor.

Five minutes later she propped herself up on her right elbow, reached for the glass, and took a long drink of water. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed. With effort she stood up, pulled the electrodes off her arms and chest, and swayed unsteadily. It took her a few seconds to gain control over her body. She hobbled to the door and leaned against the wall to catch her breath. She was in a cold sweat. Then she turned icy with rage.

Fuck you, Zalachenko. Let's end this right here and now.

She needed a weapon.

The next moment she heard quick heels clacking in the corridor.

Shit. The electrodes.

"What in God's name are you doing up?" the night nurse said.

"I had to . . . go . . . to the toilet," Salander said breathlessly.

"Get back into bed at once."

She took Salander's hand and helped her into the bed. Then she got a bedpan.

"When you have to go to the toilet, just ring for us. That's what this button is for."

Blomkvist

woke up at 10:30 on Tuesday, showered, put on coffee, and then sat down with his iBook. After the meeting at Milton Security the previous evening, he had come home and worked until 5:00 a.m. The story was finally beginning to take shape. Zalachenko's biography was still vague--all he had was what he had blackmailed Bjorck to reveal, as well as the handful of details Palmgren had been able to provide. Salander's story was pretty much done. He explained step by step how she had been targeted by a gang of Cold War mongers at SIS and locked away in a psychiatric hospital to stop her from blowing the whistle on Zalachenko.

He was pleased with what he had written. There were still some holes that he would have to fill, but he knew that he had one hell of a story. It would be a news sensation, and there would be volcanic eruptions high up in the government bureaucracy.

He smoked a cigarette while he thought.

He could see two particular gaps that needed attention. One was manageable. He had to deal with Teleborian, and he was looking forward to that assignment. When he was finished with him, the renowned children's psychiatrist would be one of the most detested men in Sweden. That was one thing.

The second thing was more complicated.

The men who conspired against Salander--he thought of them as the Zalachenko club--were inside the Security Police. He knew one, Gunnar Bjorck, but Bjorck could not possibly be the only man responsible. There had to be a group . . . a division or unit of some sort. There must be chiefs, operations managers. There had to be a budget. But he had no idea how to go about identifying these people, where even to start. He had only the vaguest notion of how Sapo was organized.

On Monday he had begun his research by sending Cortez to the secondhand bookshops on Sodermalm, to buy every book which in any way dealt with the Security Police. Cortez had come to his apartment in the afternoon with six books: Espionage in Sweden by Mikael Rosquist (Tempus, 1988); Sapo Chief 1962-1970 by P. G. Vinge (Wahlstrom & Widstrand, 1988); Secret Forces by Jan Ottosson and Lars Magnusson (Tiden, 1991); Power Struggle for Sapo by Erik Magnusson (Corona, 1989); An Assignment by Carl Lidbom (Wahlstrom & Widstrand, 1990); and--somewhat surprisingly--An Agent in Place by Thomas Whiteside (Viking, 1966), which dealt with the Wennerstrom affair. The Wennerstrom affair of the sixties, not Blomkvist's own much more recent Wennerstrom affair.