Charro hesitated, as if embarrassed.
“She took off her T-shirt because she needed to use it as a bandage and when she turned to wrap it around her shoulder I saw that she had a large tattoo of a dragon all the way up her back. That same tattoo was mentioned in one of the old newspaper articles.”
—
Berger arrived at Grane’s summer house with several shopping bags filled with food, crayons and paper, a couple of difficult puzzles, and a few other things. But there was no sign of August or Salander. Salander had not responded, either on her RedPhone app or on the encrypted link. Berger was sick with anxiety.
Whichever way she looked at it, this did not bode well. Admittedly Salander was not known for unnecessary communication or reassurance, but it was she who had asked for a safe house. Also she had responsibility for a child, and if she was not answering their calls under those circumstances, she must be in a bad way.
Berger swore and walked out onto the terrace, to where she and Grane had been sitting and talking about escaping from the world. That was only a few months ago, but it felt like an age. There was no table now, no chairs, no bottles, no hubbub behind them, only snow, branches, and debris flung there by the storm. It was as if life itself had abandoned the place. Somehow the memory of that crayfish party increased the sense of desolation, as if the festivities were draped like a ghost over its walls.
Berger went back into the kitchen and put some microwaveable food into the refrigerator: meatballs, packets of spaghetti with meat sauce, sausage stroganoff, fish pie, potato cakes, and a whole lot of even worse junk food Blomkvist had advised her to buy: Billy’s Pan Pizza, piroshki, chips, Coca-Cola, a bottle of Tullamore D.E.W., a carton of cigarettes, three bags of crisps, three bars of chocolate, and some sticks of fresh liquorice. She set out drawing paper, crayons, pencils, an eraser, and a ruler and compass on the large round table. On the top sheet of paper she drew a sun and a flower and wrote the word WELCOME in four warm colours.
The house was near Ingarö beach, but you could not see it from there. It lay high up on the rock promontory, concealed behind pine trees, and consisted of four rooms. The kitchen with glass doors onto the terrace was the largest and also the heart of the house. In addition to the round table there was an old rocking chair and two worn, sagging sofas which nonetheless managed to look inviting thanks to a pair of red tartan rugs. It was a cozy home.
It was also a good safe house. Berger left the door open, put the keys in the top drawer of the hall closet, as agreed, and wandered down the long flight of wooden stairs flanking the steep, smooth rock slope—the only way to the house for anyone arriving by car.
The sky was dark and turbulent, the wind blowing hard again. Her spirits were low and did not improve during the drive home. Her thoughts turned to Hanna Balder. Berger had not exactly been a member of the fan club—Hanna often played the parts of women who were both sexy and dim-witted, whom all men thought they could seduce, and Berger was disgusted by the film industry’s devotion to that type of character. But none of that was true any longer and Berger regretted that she had been so ungracious at the time. She had been too hard on the woman; it was only too easy to criticize a pretty girl who gets a big break early in her career.
Nowadays, on the rare occasions Hanna Balder appeared in a major production, her eyes tended to reflect a restrained sorrow, which gave depth to the parts she played, and—what did Berger know?—that may have been genuine. She had been through some difficult times, not least the past twenty-four hours.
Since morning Berger had been insisting that Hanna be taken to August. This was surely a situation in which a child needed his mother more than ever. But Salander, who was still communicating with them at the time, had been against the idea. No-one yet knew where the leak had come from, she had written, and they could not rule out the mother’s immediate circle. Lasse Westman for one, whom nobody trusted, seemed to be staying in the house all day to avoid the journalists camped outside.
They were in a bind, and Berger did not like it. She hoped Millennium would still be able to tell the story with dignity and depth, without the magazine or anyone else coming to harm. She had no doubt that Blomkvist would be up to it, given the way he looked right now. Besides, he had Zander to help him.
Berger had a soft spot for Zander. Not long ago, over dinner at her and Greger’s home in Saltsjöbaden, he had told them his life story, which had only increased her sympathy.
When Zander was eleven he lost both his parents in a bomb blast in Sarajevo. After that he came to live in Tensta outside Stockholm with an aunt who altogether failed to notice either his intellectual disposition or the psychological wounds he bore. He had not been there when his parents were killed, but his body reacted as if he were suffering from post-traumatic stress. To this day he detested loud noises and sudden movements. He hated seeing unattended bags in public places, and loathed violence with a passion Berger had never encountered before.
As a child he sought refuge in his own worlds. He immersed himself in fantasy literature, read poetry and biographies, adored Sylvia Plath, Borges and Tolkien, and learned everything there was to know about computers. He dreamed of writing heart-rending novels about love and human tragedy, and was an incurable romantic who hoped that great passion would heal his wounds. He was not in the least bit interested in the outside world. One evening in his late teens, however, he attended a public lecture given by Mikael Blomkvist at the Institute for Media Studies at Stockholm University, and it changed his life.
Blomkvist’s fervour inspired him to bear witness to a world which was bleeding with injustice and intolerance and petty corruption. He started to imagine himself writing articles critical of society instead of tear-jerking romances. Not long after that he knocked on Millennium’s door and asked if there was anything they would let him do—make coffee, proofread, run errands. Berger, who had seen the fire in his eyes right from the start, assigned him some minor editorial tasks: public notices, research, and brief portraits. But most of all she told him to study, and he did so with the same energy he put into everything else. He read political science, mass media communications, finance, and international conflict resolution, and at the same time he helped out on temporary assignments at Millennium.
He wanted to become a heavyweight investigative journalist, like Blomkvist. But unlike so many other investigative journalists he was no tough guy. He remained a romantic. Blomkvist and Berger had both spent time trying to sort out his relationship problems. He was too open and transparent. Too good, as Blomkvist would say.
But Berger believed that Zander was in the process of shedding that youthful vulnerability. She had been seeing the change in his journalism. That ferocious ambition to reach out and touch people, which had made his writing heavy-handed at first, had been replaced by a more effective, matter-of-fact style. She knew he would pull out all the stops now that he had been given the chance to help Blomkvist with the Balder story. The plan was for Blomkvist to write the big, central narrative, and for Zander to help with the research as well as writing some explanatory sidebars. Berger thought they made a great team.
After parking on Hökens gata she walked into the offices and found Blomkvist and Zander sitting there, deep in concentration, just as she expected. Every now and then, Blomkvist muttered to himself and she saw that sense of purpose in his eyes, but there was also suffering. He had hardly slept all night. The media campaign against him had not let up and in his police interviews he had to do the very thing the press accused him of—withhold information. Blomkvist did not like it one bit.
He was in many ways a model, law-abiding citizen. But if there was anyone who could get him to cross the line, it was Lisbeth Salander. Blomkvist would rather dishonour himself than betray her, which is why he kept repeating to the police: “I assert my right to protect my sources.” No wonder he was unhappy and worried about the consequences. But, like Berger, he had far greater fears for Salander and the boy than for their own sit
uation.
“How’s it going?” she asked, after watching him for a while.
“What?…Well…OK. How was it out there?”
“I made up the beds and put food in the fridge.”
“Good. And the neighbours didn’t see you?”
“There wasn’t a soul out.”
“Why are they taking so long?” he said.
“I don’t know, but I’m worried sick.”
“Let’s hope they’re resting at Lisbeth’s.”
“Let’s hope so. What else did you find out?”
“Quite a bit. But…” Blomkvist trailed off.
“Yes?”
“It’s just that…it feels as if I’m being thrown back in time, or going back to places I’ve been to before.”
“You’ll have to explain better,” she said.
“I will…”
Blomkvist glanced at his computer screen.
“But first I have to keep on digging. Let’s speak later,” he said, and so she left him and got her things to drive home, although she would be ready to join him at a second’s notice.
CHAPTER 20
NOVEMBER 23
The night had turned out to be calm, alarmingly calm, and at eight in the morning a brooding Bublanski stood facing his team in the meeting room. Having kicked out Faste, he felt reasonably sure that he could talk freely again. At least he felt safer in here with his colleagues than at his computer, or with his mobile.
“You all appreciate how serious the situation is,” he said. “Confidential information has been leaked. One person is dead as a result. A small boy’s life is in danger. In spite of immense efforts we still don’t know how this happened. The leak could have been at our end, or at Säpo, or at Oden’s Medical Centre, or in the group around Professor Edelman, or from the boy’s mother and her partner, Lasse Westman. We know nothing for certain, and therefore we have to be extremely circumspect, paranoid even.”
“We may also have been hacked or phone tapped,” Modig said. “We seem to be dealing with criminals whose command of new technologies is far beyond anything we’ve seen before.”
“Very true,” Bublanski said. “We need to take precautions at every level, not say anything significant relating to this investigation—or to any other—over the telephone, no matter how highly our superiors rate our new mobile phone system.”
“They think it’s great because it cost so much to install,” Holmberg said.
“Maybe we should also be reflecting a little on our own role,” Bublanski said, ignoring him. “I was just talking to a gifted young analyst at Säpo, Gabriella Grane—you may have heard of her. She pointed out that the concept of loyalty is not as straightforward as one might think for us policemen. We have many different loyalties, don’t we? There’s the obvious one, to the law. There’s a loyalty to the public, and to one’s colleagues, but also to our bosses, and to ourselves and our careers. Sometimes, as you all know, these interests end up competing with each other. We might choose to protect a colleague at work and thereby fail in our duty to the public, or we might be given orders from higher up, like Hans Faste was, and then that conflicts with the loyalty he should have had to us. But from now on—and I’m deadly serious—there’s only one loyalty I want to hear of, and that is to the investigation itself. We’re going to catch the murderers and we’re going to make sure that no-one else falls victim to them. Agreed? Even if the prime minister himself or the head of the CIA calls and goes on about patriotism and huge career opportunities, you still won’t utter a peep, will you?”
“No,” they all said in unison.
“Excellent. As we all know, the person who intervened on Sveavägen was none other than Lisbeth Salander, and we’re doing everything in our power to locate her.”
“Which is why we’ve got to release her name to the media!” Svensson called out, somewhat heatedly. “We need help from the public.”
“We don’t all agree on this, I know, so I’d like to raise the question again. Let’s remember that in the past Lisbeth Salander has had some very shabby treatment, from us and from the media.”
“At this point that doesn’t matter,” Svensson said.
“And it’s conceivable that people recognized her on Sveavägen and her name will come out at any moment anyway. In which case this would no longer be an issue. But before that happens, keep in mind she saved the boy’s life.”
“No doubt about that,” Svensson said. “But then she more or less kidnapped him.”
“Our information suggests that she was determined to protect the boy at all costs,” Modig said. “Salander’s experience of public institutions has been anything but positive—her entire childhood was marred by the injustices inflicted on her by Swedish officialdom. If she suspects, as we do, that there’s a leak inside the police force then there’s no chance she’s going to contact us. Fact.”
“That’s irrelevant,” Svensson insisted.
“Maybe,” Modig said. “Jan and I share your view that the most important thing here is whether it’s in the interests of the investigation to release her name. And as to the investigation, our priority is the boy’s safety, and that’s where we have a big element of uncertainty.”
“I follow your reasoning,” Holmberg said in a low, thoughtful tone which immediately commanded everyone’s attention. “If people know of Salander’s involvement then the boy will be at risk. But that still leaves a number of questions—first: What’s the ethical thing to do? And I have to say, even if there’s been a leak here we cannot accept that Salander should keep the boy hidden away. He’s a crucial part of the investigation and, leak or no leak, we’re better at protecting a child than an emotionally disturbed young woman could ever be.”
“Absolutely. Of course,” Bublanski muttered.
“And even if this isn’t a kidnapping in the ordinary sense—yes, even if it’s been carried out with the best of intentions—the potential harm to the child could be just as great. Psychologically it must be hugely damaging for him to be, as it were, on the run after everything he’s been through.”
“True,” Bublanski said. “But the question still remains: How do we handle the information we have?”
“There I agree with Curt. We have to release her name and photo right away. It could produce invaluable leads.”
“Probably,” Bublanski said. “But it could at the same time give the killers invaluable leads. We have to assume that they haven’t given up looking for the boy—quite the opposite, in fact—and since we have no idea what the connection is between the boy and Salander, we don’t know what sort of clues her name would provide them with. I’m not persuaded that we would be protecting the boy by giving the media these details.”
“But neither do we know if we’re protecting him by holding them back,” Holmberg said. “There are too many pieces of the puzzle missing for us to draw any conclusions. Is Salander doing this for someone else, for example? Does she have her own agenda for the child, other than to protect him?”
“And how could she have known that the boy and Torkel Lindén would come out onto Sveavägen at that exact moment?” Svensson said.
“Maybe she just happened to be there.”
“Doesn’t seem likely.”
“The truth is often unlikely,” Bublanski said. “That’s the nature of truth. But I agree, it doesn’t feel like a coincidence, not under the circumstances.”
“What about the fact that Mikael Blomkvist also knew something was going to happen?” Amanda Flod said.
“There’s some sort of connection between Blomkvist and Salander,” Holmberg said.
“True.”
“Blomkvist knew that the boy was at Oden’s Medical Centre, didn’t he?”
“The mother told him,” Bublanski said. “As you might imagine, she’s feeling desperate right now. I’ve just had a long conversation with her. But there was no reason on earth why Blomkvist should have known that the boy and Lindén would be tricked into going out onto th
e street.”
“Could he have had access to a computer at Oden’s?” Flod said pensively.
“I can’t imagine Mikael Blomkvist getting involved in hacking,” Modig said.
“But what about Salander?” Holmberg said. “What do we actually know about her? We have a massive file on the girl. Yet the last time we had anything to do with her, she surprised us on every count. Maybe appearances are just as deceptive this time around.”
“I agree,” Svensson said. “We have far too many question marks.”
“Question marks are about all we have. And that’s exactly why we ought to stick to the rules,” Holmberg said.
“I didn’t realize the rule book covered quite so much,” Bublanski said, with a sarcasm even he did not like.
“I only mean that we should take this for what it is—the kidnapping of a child. They disappeared almost twenty-four hours ago. We haven’t heard a word from them. We should put out Salander’s name and picture and then look carefully at all the tip-offs that come in,” Holmberg said with authority. He seemed to have the backing of the whole group, and at that Bublanski closed his eyes and reflected that he loved them all. He felt a greater affinity with his team than he did for his own brothers and sisters, or even his parents. But right now he felt compelled to disagree with them.
“We’ll do everything we can to try to find them. But for the time being we will not release the name and picture. That would only make the situation more fraught, and I don’t want to risk giving the killers any leads at all.”
“And you feel guilty,” Holmberg said, without warmth.
“I feel very guilty,” Bublanski said, thinking again of his rabbi.
—
Blomkvist was so worried about the boy and Salander that he had hardly slept. Time and again he had tried to reach Salander on her RedPhone app, but she had not answered. He had not heard a word from her since yesterday afternoon. Now he was sitting in the office, trying to immerse himself in his work and figure out what it was that had escaped him. For some time already he had had a sense—impossible to put his finger on—that there was a key piece missing, something which could shed light on the whole story. Perhaps he was fooling himself. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, a need to see a grand design. The last message from Salander on the encrypted link was:
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