Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The - Stieg Larsson [119]
Blomkvist asked how the picture archive was arranged.
“To tell you the truth, the archive is rather a mess. Since we got computers and digital photographs, the current archive is on CDs. We’ve had an intern here who spent some time scanning in important older pictures, but only a small percentage of what’s in the stacks have been catalogued. Older pictures are arranged by date in negative folders. They’re either here in the newsroom or in the attic storeroom.”
“I’m interested in photographs taken of the Children’s Day parade in 1966, but also in any photographs that were taken that week.”
Fröken Blomberg gave him a quizzical look.
“You mean the week that Harriet Vanger disappeared?”
“You know the story?”
“You couldn’t work at the Courier your whole life without knowing about it, and when Martin Vanger calls me early in the morning on my day off, I draw my own conclusions. Has something new turned up?”
Blomberg had a nose for news. Blomkvist shook his head with a little smile and gave her his cover story.
“No, and I don’t suppose anyone will ever find the solution to that puzzle. It’s rather confidential, but the fact is that I’m ghostwriting Henrik Vanger’s autobiography. The story of the missing girl is an odd topic, but it’s also a chapter that can’t really be ignored. I’m looking for something that hasn’t been used before that might illustrate that day—of Harriet and her friends.”
Blomberg looked dubious, but the explanation was reasonable and she was not going to question his story, given his role.
A photographer at a newspaper takes between two and ten rolls of film a day. For big events, it can be double that. Each roll contains thirty-six negatives; so it’s not unusual for a local newspaper to accumulate over three hundred-plus images each day, of which only a very few are published. A well-organised department cuts up the rolls of film and places the negatives in six-frame sleeves. A roll takes up about one page in a negative binder. A binder holds about 110 rolls. In a year, about twenty-five binders are filled up. Over the years a huge number of binders is accumulated, which generally lack any commercial value and overflow the shelves in the photographic department. On the other hand, every photographer and pictures department is convinced that the pictures contain a historical documentation of incalculable value, so they never throw anything away.
The Hedestad Courier was founded in 1922, and the pictures department had existed since 1937. The Courier’s attic storeroom contained about 1,200 binders, arranged, as Blomberg said, by date. The negatives from September 1966 were kept in four cheap cardboard storage binders.
“How do we go about this?” Blomkvist said. “I really need to sit at a light table and be able to make copies of anything that might be of interest.”
“We don’t have a darkroom any more. Everything is scanned in. Do you know how to work a negative scanner?”
“Yes, I’ve worked with images and have an Agfa neg. scanner of my own. I work in PhotoShop.”
“Then you use the same equipment we do.”
Blomberg took him on a quick tour of the small office, gave him a chair at a light table, and switched on a computer and scanner. She showed him where the coffee machine was in the canteen area. They agreed that Blomkvist could work by himself, but that he had to call her when he wanted to leave the office so that she could come in and set the alarm system. Then she left him with a cheerful “Have fun.”
The Courier had had two photographers back then. The one who had been on duty that day was Kurt Nylund, whom Blomkvist actually knew. Nylund was in his twenties in 1966. Then he moved