not bode well, but rather indicated that the conspiracy that had tried to eliminate Salander fifteen years earlier was not a thing of the past.
There were simply too many incidents for this to be coincidence. Never mind that Zalachenko had supposedly been murdered by a nutter. It had happened at the same time that both Blomkvist and Giannini were robbed of the document that was the cornerstone in the burden of proof. That was a shattering misfortune. And then the key witness, Gunnar Bjorck, had gone and hanged himself.
"Are we agreed that I pass this on to my contact?" Armansky said, gathering up Blomkvist's documentation.
"And this is a person that you say you can trust?"
"An individual of the highest moral standing."
"Inside Sapo?" Blomkvist said with undisguised scepticism.
"We have to be of one mind. Both Holger and I have accepted your plan and are co-operating with you. But we can't clear this matter up all by ourselves. We have to find allies within the bureaucracy if this is not going to end in calamity."
"O.K." Blomkvist nodded reluctantly. "I've never had to give out information on a story before it's published."
"But in this case you already have. You've told me, your sister, and Holger."
"True enough."
"And you did it because even you recognize that this is far more than just a scoop in your magazine. For once you're not an objective reporter, but a participant in unfolding events. And as such you need help. You're not going to win on your own."
Blomkvist gave in. He had not, in any case, told the whole truth either to Armansky or to his sister. He still had one or two secrets that he shared only with Salander.
He shook hands with Armansky.
CHAPTER 9
WEDNESDAY, 4.V
Three days after Berger started as acting editor-in-chief of S.M.P., Editor-in-Chief Morander died at lunchtime. He had been in the glass cage all morning, while Berger and assistant editor Peter Fredriksson met the sports editors so that she could get to know her colleagues and find out how they worked. Fredriksson was forty-five years old and also relatively new to the paper. He was taciturn but pleasant, with a broad experience. Berger had already decided that she would be able to depend on Fredriksson's insights when she took command of the ship. She was spending a good part of her time evaluating the people she might be able to count on and could then make part of her new regime. Fredriksson was definitely a candidate.
When they got back to the news desk they saw Morander get up and come over to the door of the glass cage. He looked startled.
Then he leaned forward, grabbed the back of a chair and held on to it for a few seconds before he collapsed to the floor.
He was dead before the ambulance arrived.
There was a confused atmosphere in the newsroom throughout the afternoon. Chairman of the Board Borgsjo arrived at 2.00 and gathered the employees for a brief memorial to Morander. He spoke of how Morander had dedicated the past fifteen years of his life to the newspaper, and the price that the work of a newspaperman can sometimes exact. Finally he called for a minute's silence.
Berger realized that several of her new colleagues were looking at her. The unknown quantity.
She cleared her throat and without being invited to, without knowing what she would say, took half a step forward and spoke in a firm voice: "I knew Håkan Morander for all of three days. That's too short a time, but from even the little I managed to know of him, I can honestly say that I would have wanted very much to know him better."
She paused when she saw out of the corner of her eye that Borgsjo was staring at her. He seemed surprised that she was saying anything at all. She took another pace forward.
"Your editor-in-chief's untimely departure will create problems in the newsroom. I was supposed to take over from him in two months, and I was counting on having the time to learn from his experience."
She saw that Borgsjo had opened his mouth as if to say something himself.
"That won't happen now, and we're going to go through a period of adjustment. But Morander was editor-in-chief of a daily newspaper, and this paper will come out tomorrow too. There are now nine hours left before we go to press and four before the front page has to be resolved. May I ask... who among you was Morander's closest confidant?"
A brief silence