Girl Who Played with Fire, The - Stieg Larsson [88]
Annika opened her mouth to say something sarcastic about her brother’s tardiness. Then she saw the expression on his face.
“Did you see anyone while you were waiting?” Blomkvist asked. His voice sounded hoarse and unnatural.
“No. Who would that be? What happened?”
Blomkvist was silent for a few seconds while he looked left and right. Everything was quiet on the street. He reached into his jacket pocket and found a crumpled pack with one cigarette left. As he lit it he could hear sirens approaching in the distance. He looked at his watch. It was 11:17 p.m.
“Annika—this is going to be a long night,” he said without looking at her as the police car turned up the street.
• • •
The first to arrive were officers Magnusson and Ohlsson. They had been on Nynäsvägen responding to what turned out to be a false alarm. Magnusson and Ohlsson were followed by a staff car with the field superintendent, Oswald Mårtensson, who had been at Skanstull when the central switchboard had sent out a call for all cars in the area. They arrived at almost the same time from different directions and saw a man in jeans and a dark jacket standing in the middle of the street raising his hand for them to stop. At the same time a woman got out of a car parked a few yards away.
All three policemen froze. The central switchboard had reported that two people had been shot, and the man was holding something in his left hand. It took a couple of seconds to be sure that it was a mobile telephone. They got out of their cars at the same time and adjusted their belts. Mårtensson assumed command.
“Are you the one who called about a shooting?”
The man nodded. He seemed badly shaken. He was smoking a cigarette and his hand was trembling when he put it in his mouth.
“What’s your name?”
“Mikael Blomkvist. Two people were just shot in this building a very short time ago. Their names are Dag Svensson and Mia Johansson. Three floors up. Their neighbours are standing outside the door.”
“Good Lord,” the woman said.
“And who are you?” Mårtensson asked Annika.
“Annika Giannini. I’m his sister,” she said, pointing at Blomkvist.
“Do you live here?”
“No,” Blomkvist said. “I was going to visit the couple who were shot. My sister gave me a ride from a dinner party.”
“You say that two people were shot. Did you see what happened?”
“No. I found them.”
“Let’s go up and have a look,” Mårtensson said.
“Wait,” Blomkvist said. “According to the neighbours the shots were fired only a minute or so before I arrived. I dialled 112 within a minute of getting here. Since then less than five minutes have passed. That means the person who killed them must still be in the area.”
“Do you have a description?”
“We haven’t seen anyone, but it’s possible that some of the neighbours saw something.”
Mårtensson motioned to Magnusson, who raised his radio and talked into it in a low voice. He turned to Blomkvist.
“Can you show us the way?” he said.
When they got inside the front door Blomkvist stopped and pointed to the cellar stairs. Mårtensson bent down and looked at the weapon. He went all the way down the stairs and tried the cellar door. It was locked.
“Ohlsson, stay here and keep an eye on this,” Mårtensson said.
Outside the apartment the crowd of neighbours had thinned out. Two had gone back to their own apartments, but the man in the dressing gown was still at his post. He seemed relieved when he saw the uniformed officers.
“I didn’t let anyone in,” he said.
“That’s good,” Blomkvist and Mårtensson said together.
“There seem to be bloody tracks on the stairs,” Officer Magnusson said.
Everyone looked at the footprints. Blomkvist looked at his Italian loafers.
“Those are probably from my shoes,” he said. “I was inside the apartment. There’s quite a bit of blood.”
Mårtensson gave Blomkvist a searching look. He used a pen to push open the apartment door and found more bloody footprints in the hall.
“To the