“If this was some run-of-the-mill crackpot who was trying to frighten us, he would have taken the cat down to the garage or even out into the woods. But he went to the crypt. There’s something compulsive about that. Just think of the risk. It’s summer and people are out and about at night, going for walks. The road through the cemetery is a main road between the north and south of Hedeby. Even if he shut the door behind him, the cat must have raised Cain, and there must have been a burning smell.”

“He?”

“I don’t think that Cecilia Vanger would be creeping around here in the night with a blowtorch.”

Salander shrugged.

“I don’t trust any last one of them, including Frode or your friend Henrik. They’re all part of a family that would swindle you if they had the chance. So what do we do now?”

Blomkvist said, “I’ve discovered a lot of secrets about you. How many people, for example, know that you’re a hacker?”

“No-one.”

“No-one except me, you mean.”

“What are you getting at?”

“I want to know if you’re OK with me. If you trust me.”

She looked at him for a long moment. Finally, for an answer, she only shrugged.

“There’s nothing I can do about it.”

“Do you trust me?” Blomkvist persisted.

“For the time being,” she said.

“Good. Let’s go over to see Frode.”

This was the first time Advokat Frode’s wife had met Salander. She gave her a wide-eyed look at the same time as she smiled politely. Frode’s face lit up when he saw Salander. He stood to welcome them.

“How nice to see you,” he said. “I’ve been feeling guilty that I never properly expressed my gratitude for the extraordinary work you did for us. Both last winter and now, this summer.”

Salander gave him a suspicious glare.

“I was paid,” she said.

“That’s not it. I made some assumptions about you when I first saw you. You would be kind to pardon me in retrospect.”

Blomkvist was surprised. Frode was capable of asking a twenty-five-year-old pierced and tattooed girl to forgive him for something for which he had no need to apologise! The lawyer climbed a few notches in Blomkvist’s eyes. Salander stared straight ahead, ignoring him.

Frode looked at Blomkvist.

“What did you do to your head?”

They sat down. Blomkvist summed up the developments of the past twenty-four hours. As he described how someone had shot at him out near the Fortress, Frode leaped to his feet.

“This is barking mad.” He paused and fixed his eyes on Blomkvist. “I’m sorry, but this has to stop. I can’t have it. I am going to talk to Henrik and break the contract.”

“Sit down,” said Blomkvist.

“You don’t understand…”

“What I understand is that Lisbeth and I have got so close that whoever is behind all of this is reacting in a deranged manner, in panic. We’ve got some questions. First of all: how many keys are there to the Vanger family crypt and who has one?”

“It’s not my province, and I have no idea,” Frode said. “I would suppose that several family members would have access to the crypt. I know that Henrik has a key, and that Isabella sometimes goes there, but I can’t tell you whether she has her own key or whether she borrows Henrik’s.”

“OK. You’re still on the main board. Are there any corporate archives? A library or something like that, where they’ve collected press clippings and information about the firm over the years?”

“Yes, there is. At the Hedestad main office.”

“We need access to it. Are there any old staff newsletters or anything like that?”

“Again I have to concede that I don’t know. I haven’t been to the archives myself in thirty years. You need to talk to a woman named Bodil Lindgren.”

“Could you call her and arrange that Lisbeth has access to the archives this afternoon? She needs all the old press clippings about the Vanger Corporation.”

“That’s no problem. Anything else?”

“Yes. Greger Vanger was holding a Hasselblad in his hand on the day the bridge accident occurred. That means that he also might have taken some pictures. Where would the pictures have ended up after his death?”

“With his widow or his son, logically. Let me call Alexander and ask him.”

“What am I looking for?” Salander said when they were on their way back to the island.

“Press clippings and staff newsletters. I want you to read through everything around the dates when the murders in the fifties and sixties were committed. Make a note of anything that strikes you. Better if you do this part of the job. It seems that your memory…”

She punched him in the side.

Five minutes later her Kawasaki was clattering across the bridge.

Blomkvist shook hands with Alexander Vanger. He had been away for most of the time that Blomkvist had been in Hedeby. He was twenty when Harriet disappeared.

“Dirch said that you wanted to look at old photographs.”

“Your father had a Hasselblad, I believe.”

“That’s right. It’s still here, but no-one uses it.”

“I expect you know that Henrik has asked me to study again what happened to Harriet.”

“That’s what I understand. And there are plenty of people who aren’t happy about that.”

“Apparently so, and of course you don’t have to show me anything.”

“Please…What would you like to see?”

“If your father took any pictures on the day of the accident, the day that Harriet disappeared.”

They went up to the attic. It took several minutes before Alexander was able to identify a box of unsorted photographs.

“Take home the whole box,” he said. “If there are any at all, they’ll be in there.”

As illustrations for the family chronicle, Greger Vanger’s box held some real gems, including a number of Greger together with Sven Olof Lindholm, the big Swedish Nazi leader in the forties. Those he set aside.

He found envelopes of pictures that Greger had taken of family gatherings as well as many typical holiday photographs-fishing in the mountains and a journey in Italy.

He found four pictures of the bridge accident. In spite of his exceptional camera, Greger was a wretched photographer. Two pictures were close-ups of the tanker truck itself, two were of spectators, taken from behind. He found only one in which Cecilia Vanger was visible in semi-profile.

He scanned in the pictures, even though he knew that they would tell him nothing new. He put everything back in the box and had a sandwich lunch as he thought things over. Then he went to see Anna.

“Do you think Henrik had any photograph albums other than the ones he assembled for his investigation about Harriet?”

“Yes, Henrik has always been interested in photography-ever since he was young, I’ve been told. He has lots of albums in his office.”

“Could you show me?”

Her reluctance was plain to see. It was one thing to lend Blomkvist the key to the family crypt-God was in charge there, after all-but it was another matter to let him into Henrik Vanger’s office. God’s writ did not extend there. Blomkvist suggested that Anna should call Frode. Finally she agreed to allow him in. Almost three feet of the very bottom shelf was taken up with photograph albums. He sat at the desk and opened the first album.

Vanger had saved every last family photograph. Many were obviously from long before his time. The oldest pictures dated back to the 1870s, showing gruff men and stern women. There were pictures of Vanger’s parents. One showed his father celebrating Midsummer with a large and cheerful group in Sandhamn in 1906. Another Sandhamn photograph showed Fredrik Vanger and his wife, Ulrika, with Anders Zorn and Albert Engström sitting at a table. Other photographs showed workers on the factory floor and in offices. He found Captain Oskar Granath who had transported Vanger and his beloved Edith Lobach to safety in Karlskrona.