Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest, The - Stieg Larsson [63]
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. Do 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 correct, almost friendly manner. She thought about what the Modig woman had said. There would be some ulterior motive, she decided.
CHAPTER 7
Monday, 11.iv – Tuesday, 12.iv
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 at Slussen. He took the lift 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 very 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 nurse, Johanna Karolina Oskarsson, whose salary was paid from a fund that had been mysteriously established to provide Palmgren with the best possible care. The nurse 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.”
“O.K.,” 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 Frey’s, packed his briefcase and checked out. He took the late afternoon train to Göteborg. He chose first class and had the compartment to himself. When he passed Årstabron he took out a ballpoint pen and a plain paper pad. He thought for a long while and then began to write. He filled half the 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 himself. What complicated the issue was that not a word of what he was writing was true.
By the time the train went through Nyköping he had already discarded a number of drafts, but he was starting to get a line on how the letters should be expressed. When they arrived in Göteborg he had twelve letters he was satisfied with. He made sure he had left clear fingerprints on each sheet.
At Göteborg Central Station he tracked