Blomkvist was racing down the corridor like a sprinter. Needham did not know what was going on, but if it had something to do with the Wasp/Balder story, he wanted to be there. He had some trouble keeping up — the journalist was in too much of a hurry to wait for the lift and instead hurtled down the stairs. By the time Needham reached the ground floor, panting, Blomkvist had already retrieved his mobiles and was engrossed in another conversation while he ran on towards the revolving doors and out into the street.
“What’s happening?” Needham said as the journalist ended his call and was trying to hail a taxi on the street.
“Problems!” Blomkvist said.
“I can drive you.”
“Like hell you can. You’ve been drinking.”
“At least we can take my car.”
Blomkvist slowed his pace and turned to Needham.
“What is it you want?”
“I want us to help each other.”
“You’ll have to catch your hacker on your own.”
“I no longer have the authority to catch anybody.”
“O.K., so where’s the car?”
As they ran to Needham’s rental car parked over by the Nationalmuseum, Blomkvist hurriedly explained that they were heading out to the Stockholm archipelago, towards Ingarö. He would get directions on the way and was not planning to observe any speed limits.
Chapter 26
August screamed, and in the same instant Salander heard footsteps, rapid footsteps along the side of the house. She grabbed her pistol and jumped to her feet. She felt terrible, but ignored it.
As she rushed over to the doorway she saw a large man appear on the terrace. For a moment she thought she had a split-second advantage, but the figure did not stop to open the glass doors. He charged straight through them with his weapon drawn and shot at the boy.
Salander returned fire, or perhaps she had already done so, she did not know. She was not even conscious of the moment in which she started running towards the man. She only knew that she crashed into him with numbing force and now lay on top of him right by the round table where the boy had been sitting moments before. Without a second’s hesitation she headbutted the man.
The contact was so violent that her head rang, and she swayed as she got to her feet. The room was spinning and there was blood on her shirt. Had she been hit again? She had no time to think. Where was August? No-one at the table, only pencils and drawings, crayons, prime-number calculations. Where the hell was he? She heard a whimpering by the refrigerator and, yes, there he was, sitting and shaking, his knees drawn up to his chest. He must have had time to throw himself to the floor.
Salander was about to rush over to him when she heard new, worrying sounds from outside, voices and branches snapping. Others were approaching, there was no time to lose. They had to be away from here. In a blinding flash she visualized the surrounding terrain and raced over to August. “Come on!” she said. August did not budge. Salander picked him up in one swift movement, her face twisted in pain. Every movement hurt. But they had to get away and August must have understood that too because he wriggled out of her grasp. So she sprang over to the table, grabbed her computer and August’s coat, and made for the terrace, past the man on the floor who raised himself groggily and tried to catch hold of August’s leg as he ran alongside her.
Salander considered killing him. Instead she kicked him hard in the throat and stomach and threw away his weapon. Then she ran across the terrace with August and down towards the steep rocky slope. But suddenly she thought of the drawing. She had not seen how far the boy had got with it. Should she go back? No, the others would be here any moment. They had to get away. But still... the drawing was also a weapon, and the cause of all this madness. She left August with her computer on the rock ledge she had identified the night before. She then launched herself back up the slope and into the house and looked on the table. At first she could not see it. Drawings of that bastard Westman were everywhere, and rows of prime numbers.
But there — there it was, and above the chess squares and the mirrors there was now a pale figure with a sharply defined scar on his forehead, which Salander by now recognized only too well. It was the same man who was lying on the floor in front of her, moaning. She whipped out her mobile, took a photograph and sent it to Bublanski and Modig. She had even scribbled a line at the top of the paper. But a second later she realized that was a mistake.
They were surrounded.
Salander had sent the same word to his Samsung as she had to Berger: <CRISIS>. It hardly left room for misunderstanding, not coming from Salander. However Blomkvist looked at it, it could only mean that she and August had been discovered, and at worst they were under attack even now. He floored the accelerator as he passed Stadsgårdskajen and emerged onto the Värmdö road.
He was driving a brand-new Audi A8, with Needham sitting next to him. Needham looked grim, and every now and then tapped something into his mobile. Blomkvist was not sure why he had allowed him to come along — maybe he wanted to discover what the man had on Salander, or no, there was something else as well. Maybe Needham could even be useful. In any case he could hardly make the situation any worse. The police had by now been alerted, but he doubted they would able to assemble a unit quickly enough — especially as they were sceptical about the lack of information. Berger had been the focal point, trying to keep them all in contact with each other, and she was the only one who knew the way. He needed all the help he could get.
He was approaching Danviksbron. Needham said something, he did not hear what. His thoughts were elsewhere. He thought of Zander — what had they done to him? Why the hell had he not come out for a beer? Blomkvist tried his number again. He tried calling Salander too. But nobody answered.
“Do you want me to tell you what we have on your hacker?” Needham said.
“Yes... why not?”
But they did not get anywhere this time either. Blomkvist’s mobile rang. Bublanski.
“I hope you realize that you and I are going to have a lot to talk about later, and you can count on there being legal consequences.”
“I hear you.”
“But for now I’m calling to give you some information. We know that Lisbeth Salander was alive at 4.22. Was that before or after she texted you?”
“Before, it must have been before.”
“O.K.”
“How can you be so specific about the time?”
“She sent us something extremely interesting. A drawing. I have to say, Mikael, it exceeded our hopes.”
“So she got the boy to draw.”
“Oh yes. I have no idea what technical issues might arise in terms of admissibility of evidence, if any, or what objections a clever defence lawyer might raise. But as far as I’m concerned there’s no doubt this is the murderer. It’s incredibly vivid, with that extraordinary mathematical precision again. In fact there’s also an equation written at the bottom of the page, I have no idea if it’s relevant to the case. But I sent the drawing to Interpol. If the man is anywhere in their database, he’s toast.”
“Are you going to send it to the press as well?”
“We’re debating that.”
“When will you be at the scene?”
“As soon as possible... hold on a second!”
Blomkvist could hear another telephone ringing in the background, and for a minute or so Bublanski was gone on another call. When he returned, he said briefly:
“We’ve had reports of gunfire out there. It doesn’t sound good.”