Girl Who Played with Fire, The - Stieg Larsson [92]
“We don’t know the motive for the murders,” Blomkvist said. “It could be something to do with Dag and Mia’s private life, or it could be a purely senseless act, but we can’t rule out that it may have had something to do with what they were working on.”
A long silence settled around the table.
At last Blomkvist cleared his throat. “As I said, we’re about to publish a story in which we name people who are extremely anxious not to be identified in this connection. Dag started with the confrontations several weeks ago. I’m thinking that if one of them—”
“Wait,” Eriksson said. “We’re exposing three policemen, at least one of whom works for Säpo and another on the vice squad. Then there are several lawyers, one prosecutor, one judge, and a couple of dirty-old-men journalists. Could one of them have killed two people to prevent the publication?”
“Well, I don’t know the answer to that,” Blomkvist said. “They all have a hell of a lot to lose, but they’re damn stupid if they thought they could quash a story like this by murdering a journalist. But we’re also exposing a number of pimps, and even if we use fictitious names it wouldn’t be hard to figure out who they are. Some of them already have records for violent crimes.”
“OK,” Malm said. “But you’re making the murders out to be executions. If I’m reading Svensson’s story correctly, we’re not talking about very bright people. Are they up to pulling off a double murder and getting away with it?”
“How bright do you have to be to fire two shots?” Eriksson said.
“We’re speculating here about something we know practically nothing about,” Berger broke in. “But we do have to ask the question. If suppressing Dag’s articles—or Mia’s dissertation, for that matter—was the motive for the murders, then we have to beef up security here in the office.”
“And a third question,” Eriksson said. “Should we go to the police with the names? What did you tell the police last night, Mikael?”
“I told them what Dag was working on, but they didn’t ask for details and I didn’t give any names.”
“We probably should,” Berger said.
“It’s not quite that simple,” Blomkvist said. “We could give them a list of names, but what do we do if the police start asking questions about how we got hold of them? We can’t reveal any source who wants to remain anonymous. And that’s certainly true of several of the girls Mia talked to.”
“What a fucking mess,” Berger said. “We’re back to the original question—should we publish?”
Blomkvist held up his hand. “Wait. We could take a vote on this, but I happen to be the publisher who’s responsible, and for the first time I think I’ll make a decision all on my own. The answer is no. We can’t publish this material in the next issue. It’s unreasonable for us simply to go ahead according to plan.”
Silence descended over the table.
“I really want to publish, obviously, but we are going to have to rewrite quite a bit. It was Dag and Mia who had the documentation, and the story was based on the fact that Mia intended to file a police report against the people we were going to name. She had expert knowledge. Have we got any information on this?”
The front door slammed and Cortez stood in the doorway.
“Is it Dag and Mia?” he asked, out of breath.
They all nodded.
“Christ. This is crazy.”
“How did you hear about it?” Blomkvist said.
“I was on my way home with my girlfriend when we heard it on a taxi radio. The police have been asking for information on fares going to their street. I didn’t recognize the address. I had to come in.”
Cortez looked so shaken that Berger got up and gave him a hug and asked him to join them at the table.
“I think Dag would want us to publish his story,” she said.
“And I agree that we should. Definitely the book. But under the circumstances, we’ll have to push