Then Salander came into the picture.

The deceased lawyer Nils Bjurman had worked in the Immigration Division at the same time as the deceased Bjorck. They were the ones who had taken care of Zalachenko. But what did they do with him?

Somebody must have made the decision. With a defector of such provenance the order must have come from the highest level.

From the government. It must have been backed by the government. Anything else would be unthinkable.

Surely?

Edklinth felt cold shivers of apprehension. This was all conceivable in practice. A defector of Zalachenko's status would have to be handled with the utmost secrecy. He would have decided as much himself. That was what Falldin's administration must have decided too. It made sense.

But what happened in 1991 did not make sense. Bjorck had hired Teleborian effectively to lock Salander up in a psychiatric hospital for children on the  -  false  -  pretext that she was mentally deranged. That was a crime. That was such a monstrous crime that Edklinth felt yet more apprehensive.

Somebody must have made that decision. It simply could not have been the government. Ingvar Carlsson had been Prime Minister at the time, and then Carl Bildt.[6] But no politician would dare to be involved in such a decision, which contradicted all law and justice and which would result in a disastrous scandal if it were ever discovered.

If the government was involved, then Sweden was not one iota better than any dictatorship in the entire world.

It was impossible.

And what about the events of April 12? Zalachenko was conveniently murdered at Sahlgrenska hospital by a mentally ill fanatic at the same time as a burglary was committed at Blomkvist's apartment and Advokat Giannini was mugged. In both latter instances, copies of Bjorck's strange report dating from 1991 were stolen. Armansky had contributed this information, but it was completely off the record. No police report was ever filed.

And at the same time, Bjorck hangs himself  -  a person with whom Edklinth wished he could have had a serious talk.

Edklinth did not believe in coincidence on such a grand scale. Inspector Bublanski did not believe in such coincidence either. And Blomkvist did not believe it. Edklinth took up his felt pen once more:

Evert Gullberg, seventy-eight years old. Tax specialist.???

Who the hell was Evert Gullberg?

He considered calling up the chief of S.I.S., but he restrained himself for the simple reason that he did not know how far up in the organization the conspiracy reached. He did not know whom he could trust.

For a moment he considered turning to the regular police. Jan Bublanski was the leader of the investigation concerning Ronald Niedermann, and obviously he would be interested in any related information. But from a purely political standpoint, it was out of the question.

He felt a great weight on his shoulders.

There was only one option left that was constitutionally correct, and which might provide some protection if he ended up in political hot water. He would have to turn to the chief to secure political support for what he was working on.

It was just before 4.00 on Friday afternoon. He picked up the telephone and called the Minister of Justice, whom he had known for many years and had dealings with at numerous departmental meetings. He got him on the line within five minutes.

"Hello, Torsten. It's been a long time. What's the problem?"

"To tell you the truth... I think I'm calling to check how much credibility I have with you."

"Credibility? That's a peculiar question. As far as I'm concerned you have absolute credibility. What makes you ask such a dramatic question?"

"It's prompted by a dramatic and extraordinary request. I need to have a meeting with you and the Prime Minister, and it's urgent."

"Whoa!"

"If you'll forgive me, I'd rather explain when we can talk in private. Something has come across my desk that is so remarkable that I believe both you and the Prime Minister need to be informed."

"Does it have anything to do with terrorists and threat assessments  - "

"No. It's more serious than that. I'm putting my reputation and career on the line by calling you with this request."

"I see. That's why you asked about your credibility. How soon do you need the meeting with the P.M.?"

"This evening if possible."

"Now you've got me worried."

"Unhappily, there's good reason for you to be worried."

"How long will the meeting take?"

"It'll probably take an hour."

"Let me call you back."

The Minister of Justice called back ten minutes later and said that the Prime Minister would meet with Edklinth at his residence at 9.30 that evening. Edklinth's palms were sweating when he put down the telephone. By tomorrow morning my career could be over.

He called Figuerola.

"Hello, Monica. At 9.00 tonight you have to report for duty. You'd better dress nicely."

"I always dress nicely," Figuerola said.

The Prime Minister gave the Director of Constitutional Protection a long, wary look. Edklinth had a sense that cogs were whirring at high speed behind the P.M.'s glasses.

The P.M. shifted his gaze to Figuerola, who had not said a word during the presentation. He saw an unusually tall and muscular woman looking back at him with a polite, expectant expression. Then he turned to the Minister of Justice, who had paled in the course of the presentation.

After a while the P.M. took a deep breath, removed his glasses, and stared for a moment into the distance.

"I think we need a little more coffee," he said.

"Yes, please," Figuerola said.

Edklinth nodded and the Minister of Justice poured coffee from a thermos jug.

"I'll sum up so that I am absolutely certain that I understood you correctly," the Prime Minister said. "You suspect that there's a conspiracy within the Security Police that is acting outside its constitutional mandate, and that over the years this conspiracy has committed what could be categorized as serious criminal acts."

"Yes."

"And you're coming to me because you don't trust the leadership of the Security Police?"

"No, not exactly," Edklinth said. "I decided to turn directly to you because this sort of activity is unconstitutional. But I don't know the objective of the conspiracy, or whether I have possibly misinterpreted something. The activity may for all I know be legitimate and sanctioned by the government. Then I risk proceeding on faulty or misunderstood information, thereby compromising some secret operation."

The Prime Minister looked at the Minister of Justice. Both understood that Edklinth was covering his back.

"I've never heard of anything like this. Do you know anything about it?"

"Absolutely not," the Minister of Justice said. "There's nothing in any report that I've seen from the Security Police that could have a bearing on this matter."

"Blomkvist thinks there's a faction within Sapo. He refers to it as the Zalachenko club," Edklinth said.

"I'd never even heard that Sweden had taken in and protected a Russian defector of such importance," the P.M. said. "He defected during the Falldin administration, you say?"

"I don't believe Falldin would have covered up something like this," the Minister of Justice said. "A defection like this would have been given the highest priority, and would have been passed over to the next administration."

Edklinth cleared his throat. "Falldin's conservative government was succeeded by Olof Palme's. It's no secret that some of my predecessors at S.I.S. had a certain opinion of Palme  - "

"You're suggesting that somebody forgot to inform the social democratic government?"

Edklinth nodded. "Let's remember that Falldin was in power for two separate mandates. Each time the coalition government collapsed. First he handed over to Ola Ullsten, who had a minority government in 1979. The government collapsed again when the moderates jumped ship, and Falldin governed together with the People's Party. I'm guessing that the government secretariat was in turmoil during those transition periods. It's also possible that knowledge of Zalachenko was confined to so small a circle that Prime Minister Falldin had no real oversight, so he never had anything to hand over to Palme."

"In that case, who's responsible?" the P.M. said.

All except Figuerola shook their heads.

"I assume that this is bound to leak to the media," the P.M. said.

"Blomkvist and Millennium are going to publish it. In other words, we're caught between the proverbial rock and hard place." Edklinth was careful to use the word "we".

The P.M. nodded. He realized the gravity of the situation. "Then I'll have to start by thanking you for coming to me with this matter as soon as you did. I don't usually agree to this sort of unscheduled meeting, but the minister here said that you were a prudent person, and that something serious must have happened if you wanted to see me outside all normal channels."

Edklinth exhaled a little. Whatever happened, the wrath of the Prime Minister was not going to come down on him.

"Now we just have to decide how we're going to handle it. Do you have any suggestions?"

"Perhaps," Edklinth said tentatively.

He was silent for so long that Figuerola cleared her throat. "May I say something?"

"Please do," the P.M. said.

"If it's true that the government doesn't know about this operation, then it's illegal. The person responsible in such a case is the criminal civil servant  -  or civil servants  -  who overstepped his authority. If we can verify all the claims Blomkvist is making, it means that a group of officers within S.I.S. have been devoting themselves to criminal activity for a long time. The problem would then unfold in two parts."

"How do you mean?"

"First we have to ask the question: how could this have been possible? Who is responsible? How did such a conspiracy develop within the framework of an established police organization? I myself work for S.I.S., and I'm proud of it. How can this have gone on for so long? How could this activity have been both concealed and financed?"

"Go on," the P.M. said.

"Whole books will probably be written about this first part. It's clear that there must have been financing, at least several million kronor annually I'd say. I looked over the budget of the Security Police and found nothing resembling an allocation for the Zalachenko club. But, as you know, there are a number of hidden funds controlled by the chief of Secretariat and chief of Budget that I have no access to."

The Prime Minister nodded grimly. Why did Sapo always have to be such a nightmare to administer?

"The second part is: who is involved? And very specifically, which individuals should be arrested? From my standpoint, all these questions depend on the decision you make in the next few minutes," she said to the P.M.

Edklinth was holding his breath. If he could have kicked Figuerola in the shin he would have done so. She had cut through all the rhetoric and intimated that the Prime Minister himself was responsible. He had considered coming to the same conclusion, but not before a long and diplomatic circumlocution.

"What decision do you think I should make?"

"I believe we have common interests. I've worked at Constitutional Protection for three years. I consider this office of central importance to Swedish democracy. The Security Police has worked satisfactorily within the framework of the constitution in recent years. Naturally I don't want the scandal to affect S.I.S. For us it's important to bear in mind that this is a case of criminal activity perpetrated by a small number of individuals."

"Activity of this kind is most definitely not sanctioned by the government," the Minister of Justice said.

Figuerola nodded and thought for a few seconds. "It is, in my view, essential that the scandal should not implicate the government  -  which is what would happen if the government tried to cover up the story."

"The government does not cover up criminal activity," the Minister of Justice said.

"No, but let's assume, hypothetically, that the government might want to do so. There would be a scandal of enormous proportions."

"Go on," the P.M. said.

"The situation is complicated by the fact that we in Constitutional Protection are being forced to conduct an operation which is itself against regulations in order to investigate this matter. So we want everything to be legitimate and in keeping with the constitution."

"As do we all," the P.M. said.

"In that case I suggest that you  -  in your capacity as Prime Minister  -  instruct Constitutional Protection to investigate this mess with the utmost urgency," Figuerola said. "Give us a written order and the authority we need."

"I'm not sure that what you propose is legal," the Minister of Justice said.

"It is legal. The government has the power to adopt a wide range of measures in the event that breaches of the constitution are threatened. If a group from the military or police starts pursuing an independent foreign policy, a de facto coup has taken place in Sweden."

"Foreign policy?" the Minister of Justice said.

The P.M. nodded all of a sudden.

"Zalachenko was a defector from a foreign power," Figuerola said. "The information he contributed was supplied, according to Blomkvist, to foreign intelligence services. If the government was not informed, a coup has taken place."

"I follow your reasoning," the P.M. said. "Now let me say my piece."