“You couldn’t work at the Courier your whole life without knowing about it, and
when Martin Vanger calls me early in the morning on my day off, I draw my own
conclusions. Has something new turned up?”
Blomberg had a nose for news. Blomkvist shook his head with a little smile and
gave her his cover story.
“No, and I don’t suppose anyone will ever find the solution to that puzzle. It’s rather
confidential, but the fact is that I’m ghostwriting Henrik Vanger’s autobiography.
The story of the missing girl is an odd topic, but it’s also a chapter that can’t really
be ignored. I’m looking for something that hasn’t been used before that might
illustrate that day—of Harriet and her friends.”
Blomberg looked dubious, but the explanation was reasonable and she was not
going to question his story, given his role.
A photographer at a newspaper takes between two and ten rolls of film a day. For
big events, it can be double that. Each roll contains thirty-six negatives; so it’s not
unusual for a local newspaper to accumulate over three hundred-plus images each
day, of which only a very few are published. A well-organised department cuts up
the rolls of film and places the negatives in six-frame sleeves. A roll takes up about
one page in a negative binder. A binder holds about 110 rolls. In a year, about
twenty-five binders are filled up. Over the years a huge number of binders is
accumulated, which generally lack any commercial value and overflow the shelves
in the photographic department. On the other hand, every photographer and
pictures department is convinced that the pictures contain a historical
documentation of incalculable value, so they never throw anything away.
The Hedestad Courier was founded in 1922, and the pictures department had
existed since 1937. The Courier’s attic storeroom contained about 1,200 binders,
arranged, as Blomberg said, by date. The negatives from September 1966 were
kept in four cheap cardboard storage binders.
“How do we go about this?” Blomkvist said. “I really need to sit at a light table and
be able to make copies of anything that might be of interest.”
“We don’t have a darkroom any more. Everything is scanned in. Do you know how
to work a negative scanner?”