“When are they going to publish? Sandberg, you said that they’re almost two weeks behind schedule. If we assume that Milton is keeping an eye on the printer’s to make sure that nobody gets hold of a copy, that means either that they’re publishing something that they don’t want to leak, or that the magazine has already been printed.”
“To coincide with the opening of the trial,” Sandberg said. “That’s the only reasonable explanation.”
Clinton nodded. “O.K. What’s going to be in the magazine?”
They thought for a while, until Nystrom broke the silence.
“In the worst case they have a copy of the 1991 report, as we said.”
Clinton and Sandberg had reached the same conclusion.
“But what can they do with it?” Sandberg said. “The report implicates Bjorck and Teleborian. Bjorck is dead. They can press hard with Teleborian, but he’ll claim that he was doing a routine forensic psychiatric examination. It’ll be their word against his.”
“And what can we do if they publish the report?” Nystrom said.
“I think we’re holding the trump card,” Clinton said. “If there’s a ruckus over the report, the focus will be on Sapo, not the Section. And when reporters start asking questions, Sapo will just pull it out of the archive…”
“And it won’t be the same report,” Sandberg said.
“Shenke has put the modified version in the archive, that is, the version Ekstrom was given to read. It was assigned a case number. So we could swiftly present a lot of disinformation to the media… We have the original, which Bjurman got hold of, and
“Good. What else could
“They can’t know anything about the Section. That wouldn’t be possible. They’ll have to focus on Sapo, and that would mean Blomkvist being cast as a conspiracy theorist.”
“By now he’s rather well known,” Clinton said slowly. “Since the resolution of the Wennerstrom affair he’s been taken pretty seriously.”
“Could we somehow reduce his credibility?” Sandberg said.
Nystrom and Clinton exchanged glances. Clinton looked at Nystrom.
“Do you think you could put your hands on… let’s say, fifty grams of cocaine?”
“Maybe from the Yugos.”
“Give it a try. And get a move-on. The trial starts in three days.”
“I don’t get it,” Sandberg said.
“It’s a trick as old as the profession. But still extremely effective.”
“Morgongava?” Edklinth said with a frown. He was sitting in his dressing gown on the sofa at home, reading through Salander’s autobiography for the third time, when Figuerola called. Since it was after midnight, he assumed that something was up.
“Morgongava,” Figuerola repeated. “Sandberg and Lars Faulsson were there at 8.30 this evening. They were tailed by Inspector Andersson from Bublanski’s gang, and we had a radio transmitter planted in Sandberg’s car. They parked near the old railway station, walked around for a while, and then returned to the car and drove back to Stockholm.”
“I see. Did they meet anyone, or –”
“No. That was the strange thing. They just got out of the car and walked around a little, then drove straight back to Stockholm, so Andersson told me.”
“I see. And why are you calling me at 12.30 at night to tell me this?”
“It took a little while to work it out. They walked past Hallvigs printers. I talked to Blomkvist about it. That’s where
“Oh shit,” Edklinth said. He saw the implications immediately.
“Since Falun was along, I have to suppose that they were intending to pay the printer’s a late-night visit, but they abandoned the expedition,” Figuerola said.
“Why?”
“Because Blomkvist asked Armansky to keep an eye on the factory until the magazine was distributed. They probably saw the car from Milton Security. I thought you’d want to know straightaway.”
“You’re right. It means that they’ve begun to smell a rat.”
“Alarm bells must have gone off in their heads when they saw the car. Sandberg dropped Faulsson off in town and then went back to Artillerigatan. We know that Clinton is there. Nystrom arrived at about the same time. The question is, what are they going to do?”
“The trial starts on Wednesday… Can you reach Blomkvist and urge him to double up on security at
“They already have good security. And they blew smoke rings round their tapped telephones – like old pros. Blomkvist is so paranoid already that he’s using diversionary tactics we could learn from.”
“I’m happy to hear it, but call him anyway.”
Figuerola closed her mobile and put it on the bedside table. She looked up and studied Blomkvist as he lay naked with his head against the foot of the bed.
“I’m to call you and tell you to beef up security at
“Thanks for the suggestion,” he said wryly.
“I’m serious. If they start to smell a rat, there’s a danger that they’ll go and do something without thinking. They might break in.”
“Henry’s sleeping there tonight. And we have a burglar alarm that goes straight to Milton Security, three minutes away.”
He lay in silence with his eyes shut.
“Paranoid,” he muttered.
CHAPTER 24
It was 6.00 on Monday morning when Linder from Milton Security called Blomkvist on his T10.
“Don’t you people ever rest?” Blomkvist said, drunk with sleep.
He glanced at Figuerola. She was up already and had changed into jogging shorts, but had not yet put on her T-shirt.
“Sure. But the night duty officer woke me. The silent alarm we installed at your apartment went off at 3.00.”
“Did it?”
“I drove down to see what was going on. This is a bit tricky. Could you come to Milton this morning? As soon as possible, that is.”
“This is serious,” Armansky said.
It was just after 8.00 when Armansky, Blomkvist and Linder were gathered in front of a T.V. monitor in a conference room at Milton Security. Armansky had also called in Johan Fraklund, a retired criminal inspector in the Solna police, now chief of Milton’s operations unit, and the former inspector Sonny Bohman, who had been involved in the Salander affair from the start. They were pondering the surveillance video that Linder had just shown them.
“What we see here is Sapo officer Jonas Sandberg opening the door to Mikael’s apartment at 3.17. He has his own keys. You will recall that Faulsson the locksmith made copies of the spare set when he and Goran Martensson broke in several weeks ago.”
Armansky nodded sternly.
“Sandberg is in the apartment for approximately eight minutes. During that time he does the following things. First, he takes a small plastic bag from the kitchen, which he fills. Then he unscrews the back plate of a
