“If a man lies with a woman having her sickness, and uncovers her nakedness, he has made naked her fountain, and she has uncovered the fountain of her blood; both of them shall be cut off from among their people.”

He went out and sat on the porch. Each verse had been underlined in Harriet’s Bible. Helita cigarette and listened to the singing of birds nearby.

He had the numbers. But he didn’t have the names. Magda, Sara, Mari, R.J., and R.L.

All of a sudden an abyss opened as Mikael’s brain made an intuitive leap. He remembered the fire victim in Hedestad that Inspector Morell had told him about. The Rebecka case, which occurred in the late forties. The girl was raped and then killed by having her head placed on smouldering coals. “And he shall cut it into pieces, with its head and its fat, and the priest shall lay them in order upon the wood that is on the fire upon the altar.” Rebecka. R.J. What was her last name?

What in God’s name had Harriet gotten herself mixed up in?

Vanger had been taken ill. He was in bed when Blomkvist knocked on his door. But Anna agreed to let him in, saying he could visit the old man for a few minutes.

“A summer cold,” Henrik explained, sniffling. “What did you want?”

“I have a question.”

“Yes?”

“Did you ever hear of a murder that took place in Hedestad sometime in the forties? A girl called Rebecka-her head was put on a fire.”

“Rebeck a Jacobsson,” Henrik said without a second’ she sitation. “That’s a name I’ll never forget, although I haven’t heard it mentioned in years.”

“But you know about the murder?”

“Indeed I do. Rebecka Jacobsson was twenty-three or twenty-four when she died. That must have been in…It was in 1949. There was a tremendous hue and cry, I had a small part in it myself.”

“You did?”

“Oh yes. Rebecka was on our clerical staff, a popular girl and very attractive. But why are you asking?”

“I’m not sure, Henrik, but I may be on to something. I’m going to have to think this through.”

“Are you suggesting that there’s a connection between Harriet and Rebecka? There were…almost seventeen years separating the two.”

“Let me do my thinking and I’ll come back and see you tomorrow if you’re feeling better.”

Blomkvist did not see Vanger the following day. Just before 1:00 a.m. he was still at the kitchen table, reading Harriet’s Bible, when he heard the sound of a car making its way at high speed across the bridge. He looked out the window and saw the flashing blue lights of an ambulance.

Filled with foreboding, he ran outside. The ambulance parked by Vanger’s house. On the ground floor all the lights were on. He dashed up the porch steps in two bounds and found a shaken Anna in the hall.

“It’s his heart,” she said. “He woke me a little while ago, complaining of pains in his chest. Then he collapsed.”

Blomkvist put his arms around the housekeeper, and he was still there when the medics came out with an unconscious Vanger on a stretcher. Martin Vanger, looking decidedly stressed, walked behind. He had been in bed when Anna called. His bare feet were stuck in a pair of slippers, and he hadn’t zipped his fly. He gave Mikael a brief greeting and then turned to Anna.

“I’ll go with him to the hospital. Call Birger and see if you can reach Cecilia in London in the morning,” he said. “And tell Dirch.”

“I can go to Frode’s house,” Blomkvist said. Anna nodded gratefully.

It took several minutes before a sleepy Frode answered Blomkvist’s ring at his door.

“I have bad news, Dirch. Henrik has been taken to the hospital. It seems to be a heart attack. Martin wanted me to tell you.”

“Good Lord,” Frode said. He glanced at his watch. “It’s Friday the thirteenth,” he said.

Not until the next morning, after he’d had a brief talk with Dirch Frode on his mobile and been assured that Vanger was still alive, did he call Berger with the news that Millennium’s new partner had been taken to the hospital with a heart attack. Inevitably, the news was received with gloom and anxiety.

Late in the evening Frode came to see him and give him the details about Henrik Vanger’s condition.

“He’s alive, but he’s not doing well. He had a serious heart attack, and he’s also suffering from an infection.”

“Have you seen him?”

“No. He’s in intensive care. Martin and Birger are sitting with him.”

“What are his chances?”

Frode waved a hand back and forth.

“He survived the attack, and that’s a good sign. Henrik is in excellent condition, but he’s old. We’ll just have to wait.”

They sat in silence, deep in thought. Blomkvist made coffee. Frode looked wretchedly unhappy.

“I need to ask you about what’s going to happen now,” Blomkvist said.

Frode looked up.

“The conditions of your employment don’t change. They’re stipulated in a contract that runs until the end of this year, whether Henrik lives or dies. You don’t have to worry.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. I’m wondering who I report to in his absence.”

Frode sighed.

“Mikael, you know as well as I do that this whole story about Harriet is just a pastime for Henrik.”

“Don’t say that, Dirch.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve found new evidence,” Blomkvist said. “I told Henrik about some of it yesterday. I’m very much afraid that it may have helped to bring on his heart attack.”

Frode looked at him with a strange expression.

“You’re joking, you must be…”

Blomkvist shook his head.

“Over the past few days I’ve found significant material about Harriet’s disappearance. What I’m worried about is that we never discussed who I should report to if Henrik is no longer here.”

“You report to me.”

“OK. I have to go on with this. Can I put you in the picture right now?”

Blomkvist described what he had found as concisely as possible, and he showed Frode the series of pictures from Järnvägsgatan. Then he explained how his own daughter had unlocked the mystery of the names in the date book. Finally, he proposed the connection, as he had for Vanger the day before, with the murder of Rebecka Jacobsson in 1949, R.J.

The only thing he kept to himself was Cecilia Vanger’s face in Harriet’s window. He had to talk to her before he put her in a position where she might be suspected of something.

Frode’s brow was creased with concern.

“You really think that the murder of Rebecka has something to do with Harriet’s disappearance?”

“It seems unlikely, I agree, but the fact remains that Harriet wrote the initials R.J. in her date book next to the reference to the Old Testament law about burnt offerings. Rebecka Jacobsson was burned to death. One connection with the Vanger family is inescapable-she worked for the corporation.”

“But what is the connection with Harriet?”

“I don’t know yet. But I want to find out. I will tell you everything I would have told Henrik. You have to make the decisions for him.”

“Perhaps we ought to inform the police.”

“No. At least not without Henrik’s blessing. The statute of limitations has long since run out in the case of Rebecka, and the police investigation was closed. They’re not going to reopen an investigation fifty-four years later.”

“All right. What are you going to do?”

Blomkvist paced a lap around the kitchen.

“First, I want to follow up the photograph lead. If we could see what it was that Harriet saw…it might be the key. I need a car to go to Norsjö and follow that lead, wherever it takes me. And also, I want to research each of the Leviticus verses. We have one connection to one murder. We have four verses, possibly four other clues. To do this…I need some help.”