Salander got out her Kawasaki on Midsummer Eve and spent the day giving it a
good overhaul. A lightweight 125cc might not be the toughest bike in the world,
but it was hers, and she could handle it. She had restored it, one nut at a time, and
she had souped it up just a bit over the legal limit.
In the afternoon she put on her helmet and leather suit and drove to Äppelviken
Nursing Home, where she spent the evening in the park with her mother. She felt a
pang of concern and guilt. Her mother seemed more remote than ever before.
During three hours they exchanged only a few words, and when they did speak,
her mother did not seem to know who she was talking to.
Blomkvist wasted several days trying to identify the car with the AC plates. After a
lot of trouble and finally by consulting a retired mechanic in Hedestad, he came to
the conclusion that the car was a Ford Anglia, a model that he had never heard of
before. Then he contacted a clerk at the motor vehicle department and enquired
about the possibility of getting a list of all the Ford Anglias in 1966 that had a
licence plate beginning AC3. He was eventually told that such an archaeological
excavation in the records presumably could be done, but that it would take time
and it was beyond the boundaries of what could be considered public information.
Not until several days after Midsummer did Blomkvist get into his borrowed Volvo
and drive north on the E4. He drove at a leisurely pace. Just short of the Härnösand
Bridge he stopped to have coffee at the Vesterlund pastry shop.
The next stop was Umeå, where he pulled into an inn and had the daily special. He
bought a road atlas and continued on to Skellefteå, where he turned towards
Norsjö. He arrived around 6:00 in the evening and took a room in the Hotel Norsjö.
He began his search early the next morning. The Norsjö Carpentry Shop was not in
the telephone book. The Polar Hotel desk clerk, a girl in her twenties, had never
heard of the business.
“Who should I ask?”
The clerk looked puzzled for a few seconds until her face lit up and she said that
she would call her father. Two minutes later she came back and explained that the
Norsjö Carpentry Shop closed in the early eighties. If he needed to talk to someone