so many times that the police had started asking questions, trying to establish whether Zala was a real person, and whether he was still alive.
As far as Svensson could discover, the name Zala had first appeared in connection with the holdup of a security van in orkelljunga in 1996. The robbers had gotten away with more than 3.3 million kronor, but they had so dramatically botched their getaway that after only twenty-four hours the police were able to identify and arrest the gang members. The following day another arrest was made. It was Nieminen, a member of Svavelsjo MC, whose role had been to supply the weapons used in the holdup.
A week after the robbery in 1996, three more people were arrested. The ring thus included eight people, of whom seven had refused to talk to the police. The eighth, a boy of nineteen named Birger Nordman, had broken down and confessed everything he knew during questioning. The trial turned into a runaway victory for the prosecution. One consequence was (Svensson's police source suspected) that Nordman was found two years later buried in a sandpit in Varmland after running away during temporary leave from prison.
According to G., the police believed that Nieminen had been the catalyst behind the whole gang. They also believed that Nordman had been killed on contract by Nieminen, who was regarded as dangerous and ruthless, but there was no evidence. While in prison he had apparently had dealings with the Aryan Brotherhood, a Nazi prison organization that in turn was linked to the Wolfpack Brotherhood and to ex-con Hell's Angels clubs around the world, as well as to other cretinous violent Nazi organizations such as the Swedish Resistance Movement.
What interested Salander, however, was something else entirely. Nordman had admitted to police that the weapons used in the robbery had come from Nieminen, and that he in turn had got them from a Serb not known to Nordman whom he named as "Sala."
Svensson had taken him for an anonymous figure in the criminal scene and reckoned that "Zala" was a nickname. But he warned that they might be dealing with a particularly cunning criminal who operated under an alias.
The last section contained Sandstrom's information on Zala, such as it was. Sandstrom had once talked on the telephone to someone using that name. The notes did not say what the conversation had been about.
At around 4:00 in the morning Salander shut down her Power-Book and sat on her window seat looking out at Saltsjon. She sat quietly for two hours, smoking one cigarette after another, thinking. She had a number of strategic decisions to make - and she had to do a risk assessment.
She had to find Zala and settle their accounts once and for all.
On Saturday evening the week before Easter, Blomkvist visited an old girlfriend on Slipgatan in the Hornstull neighbourhood. He had, for once, accepted an invitation to a party. She was married now and not remotely interested in Blomkvist as anything more than a friend, but she worked in the media and had just finished a book that had been in gestation for ten years, which dealt with the image of women in the mass media. Blomkvist had contributed to the book, which was why he was invited.
His role had been to do research on one question. He had chosen to examine the equal opportunity policies which the TT wire service, Dagens Nyheter, the TV show Rapport, and a number of other media ostentatiously promoted. Then he checked off how many men and women were in each company's management above the level of editorial assistant. The results were embarrassing: CEO-man; chairman of the board - man; editor in chief - man; foreign editor - man; managing editor - man... et cetera, until eventually the first woman turned up.
The party was at the author's house and the people there were mostly those who had helped her with the book. It was a high-spirited evening with good food and relaxed conversation. Blomkvist had meant to go home reasonably early, but many of the guests were old acquaintances he seldom saw. Besides, no-one jabbered on too much about the Wennerstrom affair. The party went on until around 2:00 on Sunday morning.
Blomkvist saw the night bus drive past before he could make it to the bus stop, but the air was mild and he decided to walk home instead of waiting for the next one. He followed Hogalidsgatan to the church and turned up Lundagatan, which instantly