Girl Who Played with Fire, The - Stieg Larsson [104]
“She never had visitors when she was working here? Would there be a record of that?”
“No. She worked from home mainly and came in only to present her reports. With a few exceptions, she never even met the clients. Possibly …” Armansky was struck by a thought.
“What?”
“There is just possibly one other person she may have got in touch with, a journalist she knew a couple of years ago. He was looking for her when she was out of the country.”
“A journalist?”
“His name is Mikael Blomkvist. Do you remember the Wennerström affair?”
Bublanski came slowly back into Armansky’s office.
“It was Blomkvist who discovered the couple in Enskede. You’ve just established a link between Salander and the murder victims.”
Armansky again felt the solid pain of the lump in his stomach.
CHAPTER 14
Maundy Thursday, March 24
Modig tried three times in half an hour to reach Nils Bjurman on his mobile. Each time she got the message that the subscriber could not be reached.
At 3:30 p.m. she drove to Odenplan and rang his doorbell. Once more, no answer. She spent the next twenty minutes knocking on doors in the apartment building to see if any of Bjurman’s neighbours knew where he might be.
In eleven of the nineteen apartments no-one was there. It was obviously the wrong time of day to be knocking on doors, and it would not get any better over the Easter weekend. In the eight apartments that were occupied, everyone was helpful. Five of them knew who Bjurman was—a polite, well-mannered gentleman on the fifth floor. No-one could provide any information as to his whereabouts. She managed to ascertain that Bjurman might be visiting one of his closest neighbours, a businessman named Sjöman. But nobody answered the door there either.
Frustrated, Modig took out her mobile and called Bjurman’s answering machine once again. She gave her name, left her number, and asked him to please contact her as soon as he could.
She went back to Bjurman’s door and wrote him a note asking him to call her. She got out a business card and dropped that through the mail slot as well. Just as she closed the flap, she heard a telephone ring inside the apartment. She leaned down and listened intently as it rang four times. She heard the answering machine click on, but she could not hear any message.
She closed the flap on the mail slot and stared at the door. Exactly what impulse made her reach out and touch the handle she could not have said, but to her great surprise the door was unlocked. She pushed it open and peered into the hall.
“Hello!” she called cautiously and listened. There was no sound.
She took a step into the hall and then hesitated. She had no warrant to search the premises and no right to be in the apartment, even if the door was unlocked. She looked to her left and got a glimpse of the living room. She had just decided to back out of the apartment when her glance fell on the hall table. She saw a box for a Colt Magnum pistol.
Modig suddenly had a strong sense of unease. She opened her jacket and drew her service weapon, which she had rarely done before.
She clicked off the safety catch and aimed the gun at the floor as she went to the living room and looked in. She saw nothing untoward, but her apprehension increased. She backed out and peered into the kitchen. Empty. She went down the corridor and pushed open the bedroom door.
Bjurman’s naked body lay half stretched out on the bed. His knees were on the floor. It was as though he had knelt to say his prayers.
Even from the door Modig could tell that he was dead. Half of his forehead had been blown away by a shot to the back of his head.
Modig closed the apartment door behind her. She still had her service revolver in her hand as she flipped open her mobile and called Inspector Bublanski. She could not reach him. Next she called Prosecutor Ekström. She made a note of the time. It was 4:18.
Faste looked at the entrance door to the building on Lundagatan.