back to her computer. Martin Vanger greeted her automatically but looked so
distracted that he hardly seemed to notice her. Blomkvist poured him a cup of
coffee and invited him to have a seat.
“What’s this all about?”
“You don’t subscribe to the Hedestad Courier?”
“No. But sometimes I see it at Susanne’s Bridge Café.”
“Then you haven’t read this morning’s paper.”
“You make it sound as if I ought to.”
Martin Vanger put the day’s paper on the table in front of him. He had been given
two columns on the front page, continued on page four. “Convicted Libel Journalist
Hiding Here.” A photograph taken with a telephoto lens from the church hill on the
other side of the bridge showed Blomkvist coming out of the cottage.
The reporter, Torsson, had cobbled together a scurrilous piece. He recapitulated
the Wennerström affair and explained that Blomkvist had left Millennium in
disgrace and that he had recently served a prison term. The article ended with the
usual line that Blomkvist had declined to comment to the Hedestad Courier. Every
self-respecting resident of Hedestad was put on notice that an Olympic-class shit
from Stockholm was skulking around the area. None of the claims in the article was
libellous, but they were slanted to present Blomkvist in an unflattering light; the
layout and type style was of the kind that such newspapers used to discuss political
terrorists. Millennium was described as a magazine with low credibility “bent on
agitation,” and Blomkvist’s book on financial journalism was presented as a
collection of “controversial claims” about other more respected journalists.
“Mikael...I don’t have words to express what I felt when I read this article. It’s
repulsive.”
“It’s a put-up job,” Blomkvist said calmly.
“I hope you understand that I didn’t have the slightest thing to do with this. I
choked on my morning coffee when I read it.”
“Then who did?”