<What about any signals from his mobile?>
<Stone dead>
That drunk buffoon could have gone anywhere. Either inland, into the depths of Norrland, or up towards the coast. And she had no fucking clue where they had taken Blomkvist. She felt like screaming and hitting out. But she controlled herself and sat there wondering if it would be worth contacting the bastards, seeing if that would help her work something out. She went into the e-mail account she had been given and discovered something new: two lines of numbers and letters she could not make sense of at first. Then she saw that they were GPS coordinates, of a place in the Uppland parish of Morgonsala:
Morgonsala.
What did that mean? Last time they had summoned her to a place outside Sunnersta, with incredibly detailed instructions on how to get there. Now, no directions, not a single word, just a reference to a position located…where?…she had a closer look—somewhere in the sticks, in the middle of a field. She saw that Morgonsala was a small community with sixty-eight inhabitants, northeast of Tierp, consisting mainly of forest and plains. There was a church, of course, and some ancient ruins as well as a few abandoned industrial sites from the ’70s and ’80s, when the district was humming with entrepreneurial spirit. She thought that looked quite promising, and when she put the coordinates into Google Earth she discovered a long, rectangular brick building with large glass windows standing in the middle of a field, not far from the forest.
Just about any building in Sweden could be a hiding place for criminals, there was a whole country to search through. Why point straight at that one? Why send her any coordinates at all? Was it a red herring? A trap?
She looked again at the map and saw that Rocknö, where Kovic had stopped at the service station, was right by the turnoff to Morgonsala.
Had one of Camilla’s lot squealed? Was that conceivable? Admittedly, it couldn’t have been a popular move to order the Svavelsjö crew to go after someone like Blomkvist. It would have seemed too risky, but why leak the information to her? What were they hoping for in return?
It made no sense. She wrote to Plague:
<May have a lead in Morgonsala>
<Tell me>
She sent him the GPS coordinates and wrote:
<Going there now. Could you create some havoc in the neighbourhood?>
<Always happy to stir up shit. How?>
<Electricity, multiple mobile messaging>
<Got you>
<Keep in touch>
Then she got on her motorcycle and rode at a reckless speed to Morgonsala. Before long she noticed the wind growing stronger. The sky was clouding over and she gripped the handlebars so tightly that her fingers whitened inside her gloves.
CHAPTER 32
August 28
Ivan Galinov looked down at the journalist on the stretcher. What a fighter. He had not for a long time seen anyone go through this level of pain with such stoicism. But that did not help now. Time was passing and they could wait no longer. The journalist had to die—perhaps in vain, but it no longer mattered. For better or for worse, Galinov thought, here he now was, driven by the shadows of the past. By the fire itself, one could say.
Unlike so many of his colleagues at the GRU, Galinov had not applauded when Zalachenko’s twelve-year-old daughter threw a Molotov cocktail into his car and watched him burn. Instead he had withdrawn, and sworn to go after that girl one day. There was no denying that he had been floored all those years ago when he heard that Zalachenko, his closest friend and mentor, had defected and become the worst of the worst, a traitor to his country.
But later he realized it was not that simple, and they had reconnected, picking up more or less where they left off. They met in secret to exchange information, and they built up Zvezda Bratva together. Nobody, not even his own father, had meant as much to him as Zalachenko. Galinov would always honour his memory, in spite of the fact that he knew Zala had been the author of so much evil, not only in his profession but in other ways too, against his own flesh and blood, for instance. And that was another aspect of the drama that had brought him here.
He would do anything for Kira. He saw in her both Zala and himself, both the traitor and the betrayed, both the victim and the one inflicting the pain, and he had never seen her as distraught as she was after speaking to Blomkvist on the stretcher.
Galinov drew himself up. It was afternoon by now, his body was tired and his eyes were stinging. But here he was and he had to finish off the job. He had never enjoyed this kind of work, not like Kira or Zala. For him it was only a duty.
“Let’s get this over with, Mikael,” he said. “You’ll manage just fine.”
Blomkvist did not reply. He just clenched his jaw and steeled himself. The stretcher he was lying on was soaked in sweat. His feet were badly burned and gashed and there was a steady blaze in the furnace, like a gaping monster in front of him. Galinov had no trouble imagining himself in Blomkvist’s position.
He had himself been tortured and at one point was certain that he was going to be executed. As some sort of comfort both for him and for Blomkvist, he believed there must be a limit to extreme pain, a moment when the body closes down. There was no evolutionary point in limitless suffering, especially when all hope was gone.
“Are you ready?” he said.
“I…have…” the journalist said, but he had evidently reached that limit because nothing more was heard.
Galinov checked that the stretcher would still roll freely and wiped the sweat from his cheeks. He caught a glimpse of himself in the metal frame of the furnace and readied himself.
* * *
—
Blomkvist would have liked to say just about anything, if only to buy himself some respite. But his strength was gone and now memories and thoughts washed over him like a tidal wave. He saw his daughter before him, and his parents and Lisbeth and Erika, it was far more than he could take in, and he felt his back arching. His legs and hips were shaking and he realized, this is it, I am going to burn alive, and he tried to look up at Galinov but everything was blurred.
The whole room seemed hazy, he couldn’t tell if the lights really were starting to blink and go out, or if he was hallucinating. For a while he thought that the darkness was a part of his mortal terror. But then he heard footsteps and voices, and saw Galinov turn and say in Swedish:
“What the hell’s going on?”
Several agitated voices answered. What was it? Blomkvist only knew that there was a sudden commotion in the building, that the electricity seemed to have failed. Everything had gone out except the furnace, which still burned with the same menacing intensity, leaving him one push away from an agonizing death. But all this uproar must mean…that there was hope, surely. He looked around and saw shadowy figures moving in the dark.