P.S. I miss you. I have a feeling that something nasty happened in Hedestad. Christer says that you have a strange mark on your neck.

____________________

From ‹[email protected]›

To ‹[email protected]›:

Hi Ricky. The story about Harriet is so miserably awful that you can’t even imagine it. It would be great if she could tell you about it herself. I can hardly bring myself to think about it.

By the way, you can trust her. She was telling the truth when she said that she owes a debt of gratitude to me-and believe me, she will never do anything to harm Millennium. Be her friend if you like her. She deserves respect. And she’s a hell of a businesswoman./M.

The next day Mikael received another email.

From ‹[email protected]›

To ‹[email protected]›:

Hi Mikael. I’ve been trying to find time to write to you for several weeks now, but it seems there are never enough hours in the day. You left so suddenly from Hedeby that I never had a chance to say goodbye.

Since my return to Sweden, my days have been filled with bewildering impressions and hard work. The Vanger Corporation is in chaos, and along with Henrik I’ve been working hard to put its affairs in order. Yesterday I visited the Millennium offices; I’ll be Henrik’s representative on the board. Henrik has filled me in on all the details of the magazine’s situation and yours.

I hope that you will accept having me show up like this. If you don’t want me (or anyone else from the family) on the board, I’ll understand, but I do assure you that I’ll do all I can to support Millennium. I am in great debt to you, and I will always have the best of intentions in this regard.

I met your colleague Erika Berger. I’m not sure what she thought of me, and I was surprised to hear that you hadn’t told her about what happened.

I would very much like to be your friend. If you can stand to have anything more to do with the Vanger family. Best regards, Harriet

P.S. I understood from Erika that you’re planning to tackle Wennerström again. Dirch Frode told me how Henrik pulled a swifty on you, as they say in Australia. What can I say? I’m sorry. If there’s anything I can do, let me know.

____________________

From ‹[email protected]›

To ‹[email protected]›:

Hi Harriet. I left Hedeby in a big hurry and am now working on what I really should have been spending my time on this year. You’ll be advised in plenty of time before the article goes to press, but I think I can say that the problems of the past year will soon be over.

I hope you and Erika will be friends, and, of course, I have no problem with you being on Millennium’s board. I’ll tell Erika about what happened, if you think that’s wise. Henrik wanted me never to say anything to anyone. Let’s see, but right now I don’t have the time or the energy and I need a little distance first.

Let’s keep in touch. Best/Mikael

Salander was not especially interested in what Mikael was writing. She looked up from her book when Blomkvist said something, but at first she could not make it out.

“Sorry. I was talking aloud. I said that this is horrible.”

“What’s horrible?”

“Wennerström had an affair with a twenty-two-year-old waitress and he got her pregnant. Have you read his correspondence with his lawyer?”

“My dear Mikael-you have ten years of correspondence, emails, agreements, travel arrangements, and God knows what on that hard drive. I don’t find Wennerström so fascinating that I’d cram six gigs of garbage into my head. I read through a fraction of it, mostly to satisfy my curiosity, and that was enough to tell me that he’s a gangster.”

“OK. He got her pregnant in 1997. When she wanted compensation, his lawyer got someone to try to convince her to have an abortion. I assume the intention was to offer her a sum of money, but she wasn’t interested. Then the persuading ended up with the heavy holding her underwater in a bath until she agreed to leave Wennerström in peace. And Wennerström’s idiot writes all this to the lawyer in an email-of course encrypted, but even so…It doesn’t say much for the IQ of this bunch.”

“What happened to the girl?”

“She had an abortion, and Wennerström was pleased.”

Salander said nothing for ten minutes. Her eyes had suddenly turned dark.

“One more man who hates women,” she muttered at last.

She borrowed the CDs and spent the next few days reading through Wennerström’s emails and other documents. While Blomkvist kept working, Salander was up in the sleeping loft with her PowerBook on her knees, pondering Wennerström’s peculiar empire.

An idea had occurred to her and she could not let it go. Most of all she wondered why it had not occurred to her sooner.

In late October Mikael turned off his computer when it was only 11:00 in the morning. He climbed up to the sleeping loft and handed Salander what he had written. Then he fell asleep. She woke him that evening and gave him her opinion of the article.

Just after 2:00 in the morning, Blomkvist made the last backup of his work.

The next day he closed the shutters on the windows and locked up. Salander’s holiday was over. They went back to Stockholm together.

He brought up the subject as they were drinking coffee from paper cups on the Vaxholm ferry.

“What the two of us need to decide is what to tell Erika. She’s going to refuse to publish this if I can’t explain how I got hold of the material.”

Erika Berger. Blomkvist’s editor in chief and long-time lover. Salander had never met her and was not sure that she wanted to either. Berger seemed like some indefinable disturbance in her life.

“What does she know about me?”

“Nothing.” He sighed. “The fact is that I’ve been avoiding her ever since the summer. She’s very frustrated about the fact that I couldn’t tell her what happened in Hedestad. She knows, of course, that I’ve been staying out at Sandhamn and writing this story, but she doesn’t know what it’s about.”

“Hmm.”

“In a couple of hours she’ll have the manuscript. Then she’s going to give me the third degree. The question is, what should I tell her?”

“What do you want to tell her?”

“I’d like to tell her the truth.”

Salander frowned.

“Lisbeth, Erika and I argue almost all the time. It seems to be part of how we communicate. But she’s absolutely trustworthy. You’re a source. She would rather die than reveal who you are.”

“How many others would you have to tell?”

“Absolutely no-one. It will go to the grave with me and Erika. But I won’t tell her your secret if you don’t want me to. On the other hand, it’s not an option for me to lie to Erika, make up some source that doesn’t exist.”