The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets Nest Page 0,83

answer questions from the police, deep inside she was pleased with Salander's silence. The reason was simple. It was a consistent silence. It contained no lies that could entangle her, no contradictory reasoning that would look bad in court.

But she was astonished at how imperturbable Salander was. When they were alone she had asked her why she so provocatively refused to talk to the police.

"They'll twist what I say and use it against me."

"But if you don't explain yourself, you risk being convicted anyway."

"Then that's how it'll have to be. I didn't make all this mess. And if they want to convict me, it's not my problem."

Salander had in the end described to her lawyer almost everything that had happened at Stallarholmen. All except for one thing. She would not explain how Magge Lundin had ended up with a bullet in his foot. No matter how much she asked and nagged, Salander would just stare at her and smile her crooked smile.

She had also told Giannini what happened in Gosseberga. But she had not said anything about why she had run her father to ground. Did she go there expressly to murder him - as the prosecutor claimed - or was it to make him listen to reason?

When Giannini raised the subject of her former guardian, Nils Bjurman, Salander said only that she was not the one who shot him. And that particular murder was no longer one of the charges against her. And when Giannini reached the very crux of the whole chain of events, the role of Dr Teleborian in the psychiatric clinic in 1991, Salander lapsed into such inexhaustible silence that it seemed she might never utter a word again.

This is getting us nowhere, Giannini decided. If she won't trust me, we're going to lose the case.

Salander sat on the edge of her bed, looking out of the window. She could see the building on the other side of the car park. She had sat undisturbed and motionless for an hour, ever since Giannini had stormed out and slammed the door behind her. She had a headache again, but it was mild and it was distant. Yet she felt uncomfortable.

She was irritated with Giannini. From a practical point of view she could see why her lawyer kept going on and on about details from her past. Rationally she understood it. Giannini needed to have all the facts. But she did not have the remotest wish to talk about her feelings or her actions. Her life was her own business. It was not her fault that her father had been a pathological sadist and murderer. It was not her fault that her brother was a murderer. And thank God nobody yet knew that he was her brother, which would otherwise no doubt also be held against her in the psychiatric evaluation that sooner or later would inevitably be conducted. She was not the one who had killed Svensson and Johansson. She was not responsible for appointing a guardian who turned out to be a pig and a rapist.

And yet it was her life that was going to be turned inside out. She would be forced to explain herself and to beg for forgiveness because she had defended herself.

She just wanted to be left in peace. And when it came down to it, she was the one who would have to live with herself. She did not expect anyone to be her friend. Annika Bloody Giannini was most likely on her side, but it was the professional friendship of a professional person who was her lawyer. Kalle Bastard Blomkvist was out there somewhere - Giannini was for some reason reluctant to talk about her brother, and Salander never asked. She did not expect that he would be quite so interested now that the Svensson murder was solved and he had got his story.

She wondered what Armansky thought of her after all that had happened.

She wondered how Holger Palmgren viewed the situation.

According to Giannini, both of them had said they would be in her corner, but that was words. They could not do anything to solve her private problems.

She wondered what Miriam Wu felt about her.

She wondered what she thought of herself, come to that, and came to the realization that most of all she felt indifference towards her entire life.

She was interrupted when the Securitas guard put the key in the door to let in Dr Jonasson.

"Good evening, Froken Salander. And how are