“But Bjurman, of all people. I presume it wasn’t by chance that he became her guardian.”
There were several seconds of silence on the line.
“No, it was no accident. It seemed like a good idea two years ago. Who could have predicted this?”
“How much did Bjurman know?”
His former boss chuckled. “You know quite well what Bjurman was like. Not the most talented actor.”
“I mean… did he know about the connection? Could there be something among his papers or personal effects that would lead anyone to – ”
“No, of course not. I understand what you’re getting at, but don’t worry. Salander has always been the loose cannon in this story. We arranged it so that Bjurman got the assignment, but that was only so we’d have someone we could check up on. Better that than an unknown quantity. If she had started blabbing, he would have come to us. Now this will all work out for the best.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, after this, Salander is going to be sitting in a psychiatric ward for a long, long time.”
“That makes sense.”
“Don’t worry. Go and enjoy your sick leave in peace and quiet.”
But that was exactly what Bjorck was unable to do. Blomkvist had seen to that. He sat at the kitchen table and looked out over Jungfrufjarden as he tried to sum up his own situation. He was being threatened from two flanks.
Blomkvist was going to hang him out to dry as a john. There was a serious risk that he would end his police career by being convicted of breaking the sex-trade law.
But even more serious was the fact that Blomkvist was trying to track down Zalachenko. Somehow he was mixed up in the story too. And Zala would lead him back to Bjorck’s front door.
His former boss had apparently been assured that there was nothing among Bjurman’s personal effects that could provide a further lead. But there was. The report from 1991. And Bjurman had gotten it from Bjorck.
He tried to visualize the meeting with Bjurman more than three months earlier. They had met in Gamla Stan. Bjurman had called him one afternoon at work and suggested they have a beer. They talked about the shooting club and everything under the sun, but Bjurman had sought him out for a particular reason. He needed a favour. He had asked about Zalachenko…
Bjorck got up and stood by the kitchen window. He had been a little tipsy at the meeting. In fact he was quite drunk. What had Bjurman asked him?
Technically, it was none of Bjurman’s business. In fact there was good reason to put Bjurman under the microscope just for having asked… but he was Salander’s guardian. He said he needed the old report.
Bjorck had made a serious mistake. He had assumed that Bjurman had already been informed – anything else would have seemed unthinkable. And Bjurman had presented the matter as though he was only trying to take a shortcut through the plodding bureaucratic procedure in which everything was stamped “confidential” and hush- hush and could drag on for months. In particular anything that had to do with Zalachenko.
Bjurman had made a fool of him. The more Bjorck thought about it, the more convinced he was that Bjurman had chosen his words deliberately, very cautiously.
But what the fuck was Bjurman after? And why would Salander have murdered him?
Blomkvist went to the apartment in Lundagatan four more times on Saturday in the hope of finding Miriam Wu, but she was never there.
He spent a good part of the day at the Kaffebar on Hornsgatan with his iBook, rereading the emails that Svensson had received at his
Blomkvist wished he could phone Svensson and ask him why the document about Irina P. was in the folder. The only reasonable conclusion was that Svensson had suspected Zala of murdering her.
At 5:00 p.m. Bublanski called and gave him Miriam Wu’s phone number. He didn’t know what had made the detective change his mind, but now that he had the number he tried it about once every half hour. Not until 11:00 p.m. did she answer. It was a short conversation.
“Hello, Miriam. My name is Mikael Blomkvist.”
“And who the hell are you?”
“I’m a journalist and I work at a magazine called
Miriam Wu expressed her feelings in a pithy way. “Ah yes. That Blomkvist. Go to hell, journalist creep.”
She broke off the connection before Blomkvist had a chance to explain what he wanted. He directed some bad thoughts at Tony Scala and tried to call back. She did not answer. In the end he sent a text message.
She never called.
Late that night Blomkvist shut down his computer, undressed, and crawled into bed. He wished he had Berger to keep him company.
PART 4. Terminator Mode
March 24 – April 8
A root of an equation is a number which substituted into the equation instead of an unknown converts the equation into an identity. The root is said to satisfy the equation. Solving an equation implies finding all of its roots. An equation that is always satisfied, no matter the choice of values for its unknowns, is called an identity.
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CHAPTER 21
Salander spent the first week of the police hunt far from the drama. She remained in peace and quiet in her apartment on Fiskargatan. Her mobile was turned off and the SIM card taken out. She did not intend to use that phone again. Her eyes grew wide with astonishment as she followed the stories in the online editions of the newspapers and on the TV news programmes.
She was irritated by the passport photograph that appeared everywhere. She looked stupid.
Despite her years of striving for anonymity, she had been transformed overnight into one of the most
