in the yard.
Bublanski felt a sense of frustration approaching fury.
What the hell was going on? Who were these thugs? Who was this Salander person really? And why was it impossible to find her?
The situation did not improve when Ekstrom joined the fray at the 9:00 meeting. Bublanski told him about the morning's dramatic developments and proposed that the search be reprioritized in light of the mysterious events that had taken place, which cast doubt on the scenario that the team had been working on.
Paolo Roberto's story reinforced Blomkvist's account of the attack on Salander on Lundagatan. The hypothesis that all three murders were committed by one mentally ill woman no longer seemed valid. The suspicions regarding Salander could not altogether be discarded - they needed an explanation for her fingerprints being on the murder weapon - but it did mean that the investigation had to work on the possibility of a different killer. There was only one theory at present - Blomkvist's belief that the murders had to do with Svensson's imminent expose of the sex trade. Bublanski identified three significant points.
The prime task was to find and identify the abnormally large man and his associate with the ponytail who had kidnapped and assaulted Miriam Wu. The giant should be relatively easy to find.
Andersson reminded them that Salander also had an unusual appearance, and that after three weeks of searching, the police still had no idea where she was.
The second task was to add to the investigative team a group that would actively focus on the list of prostitutes' clients in Svensson's computer. There was a logistical problem associated with this. The team had Svensson's computer from Millennium and the Zip disks that held the backup of his missing laptop, but they contained several years' worth of collected research and thousands of pages. It would take time to catalogue and study them. The team needed reinforcements, and Bublanski detailed Modig to head that unit.
The third task was to focus on a person who went by the name of Zala. The team would enlist the assistance of the National Criminal Investigation Department, since they apparently had come across the name. He assigned that task to Faste.
Finally, Andersson was to coordinate the continued search for Salander.
Bublanski's report took six minutes, but it touched off an hour-long dispute. Faste was vociferous in his resistance to Bublanski's proposals, and he made no attempt to conceal this. His opinion was that the investigation, regardless of the new - peripheral, he called it - information, had to stay focused on Salander. The chain of evidence was so strong that it was unreasonable to divide the effort into different channels.
"This is all bullshit. We have a violence-prone nutcase who has grown worse and worse over the years. Do you actually believe that all the psychiatric reports and results from forensics are a joke? She's tied to the crime scene. We know she's a hooker, and there's a large sum of money unaccounted for in her bank account."
"I'm aware of all that."
"She's also a member of some sort of lesbian sex cult. And I'll be damned if that dyke Cilla Noren doesn't know more than she's letting on."
Bublanski raised his voice. "Faste. Stop it. You're totally obsessed with this gay angle. It's way past professional."
He at once regretted speaking out in front of the whole group. A private talk with Faste would have been more productive. Finally Ekstrom interrupted the raised voices to approve Bublanski's plan of action.
Bublanski glanced at Bohman and Hedstrom.
"As I understand it, we only have you for three more days, so let's make the best of the situation. Bohman, can you help Andersson track down Salander? Hedstrom, you'll stay with Modig."
Ekstrom raised his hand as they were about to break up.
"One last thing. We're keeping the part about Paolo Roberto under our hats. The media will go ballistic if one more celebrity springs to light in this investigation. So not a word about it outside this room."
After the meeting Modig took Bublanski aside.
"It was unprofessional of me to lose patience with Faste," Bublanski said.
"I know how it feels," she said with a smile. "I started on Svensson's computer last Monday."
"I know. How far did you get?"
"He had a dozen versions of the manuscript and a huge amount of research material, and I don't know yet what's important and what's safe to ignore. Just cataloguing it with meaningful names and looking through all the documents will take several days."
"What about Hedstrom?"
Modig hesitated. Then she turned