Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest, The - Stieg Larsson [106]
“Could I read the original?”
“Certainly you can. I have to take the report with me when I go. And before you read it, let me direct your attention to the appendix containing the subsequent correspondence between Björck and Teleborian. It is almost entirely fabricated. Here it’s not a matter of subtle alterations, but of gross falsifications.”
“Falsifications?”
“I think that’s the only appropriate description. The original shows that Peter Teleborian was assigned by the district court to do a forensic psychiatric examination of Lisbeth Salander. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Salander was twelve years old and had tried to kill her father – it would have been very strange if that shocking event had not resulted in a psychiatric report.”
“That’s true.”
“If you had been the prosecutor, I assume that you would have insisted on both social and psychiatric investigations.”
“Of course.”
“Even then Teleborian was a well-respected child psychiatrist who had also worked in forensic medicine. He was given the assignment, conducted a normal investigation, and came to the conclusion that the girl was mentally ill. I don’t have to use their technical terms.”
“No, no …”
“Teleborian wrote this in a report that he sent to Björck. The report was then given to the district court, which decided that Salander should be cared for at St Stefan’s. Blomkvist’s version is missing the entire investigation conducted by Teleborian. In its place is an exchange between Björck and Teleborian, which has Björck instructing Teleborian to falsify a mental examination.”
“And you’re saying that it’s an invention, a forgery?”
“No question about it.”
“But who would be interested in creating such a thing?”
Nyström put down the report and frowned. “Now you’re getting to the heart of the problem.”
“And the answer is …?”
“We don’t know. That’s the question our analytical group is working very hard to answer.”
“Could it be that Blomkvist made some of it up?”
Nyström laughed. “That was one of our first thoughts too. But we don’t think so. We incline to the view that the falsification was done a long time ago, presumably more or less simultaneously with the writing of the original report. And that leads to one or two disagreeable conclusions. Whoever did the falsification was extremely well informed. In addition, whoever did it had access to the very typewriter that Björck used.”
“You mean …”
“We don’t know where Björck wrote the report. It could have been at his home or at his office or somewhere else altogether. We can imagine two alternatives. Either the person who did the falsification was someone in the psychiatric or forensic medicine departments, who for some reason wanted to involve Teleborian in a scandal. Or else the falsification was done for a completely different purpose by someone inside the Security Police.”
“For what possible reason?”
“This happened in 1991. There could have been a Russian agent inside S.I.S. who had picked up Zalachenko’s trail. Right now we’re examining a large number of old personnel files.”
“But if the K.G.B. had found out … then it should have leaked years ago.”
“You’re right. But don’t forget that this was during the period when the Soviet Union was collapsing and the K.G.B. was dissolved. We have no idea what went wrong. Maybe it was a planned operation that was shelved. The K.G.B. were masters of forgery and disinformation.”
“But why would the K.G.B. want to plant such a forgery?”
“We don’t know that either. But the most obvious purpose would have been to involve the Swedish government in a scandal.”
Ekström pinched his lip. “So what you’re saying is that the medical assessment of Salander is correct?”
“Oh yes. Salander is, to put it in colloquial terms, stark raving mad. No doubt about that. The decision to commit her to an institution was absolutely correct.”