The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye: Continuing Stieg Larsson's Millennium Series Read Online Free PDF Page B

came across a site for an antiquated-looking place – the Institute for Medical Genetics – that she paused and keyed in a few commands. Within seconds the screen went totally black. She was motionless, her breathing heavy and her fingers hovering over the keyboard, like a pianist preparing for a difficult piece.
    Then she hammered something out with astonishing speed, rows of white numbers and letters on the black screen. Soon after the computer began to write by itself, spewing a flood of symbols, incomprehensible program codes and commands. He could only understand the occasional English word, Connecting database, Search, Query and Response, and then Bypassing security, which was more than a little alarming. She waited, drumming her fingers on the table impatiently. “Shit!” A window had popped up that read ACCESS DENIED . She tried several more times until at last a ripple went across the screen, disappearing inwards, and then a flash of colour: ACCESS GRANTED . Soon things began to happen which Olsen had not imagined possible. It was as if Salander was drawn in through a wormhole into cyber worlds belonging to another time, a time long before the internet.
    She flicked past old, scanned documents and lists of names recorded with a typewriter or ballpoint pen. These were followed by columns of numbers and notes, which looked like test results. Some of the documents were stamped CONFIDENTIAL . He saw her own name among many others, and a whole series of reports. It was as if she had turned the computer into a snake which moved soundlessly through secret archives and sealed vaults. She kept going for hours, on and on.
    He still had no idea what she was up to, though he could tell from her body language and her muttering that she did not quite reach her goal. After four and a half hours she gave up. He heaved a sigh of relief. He needed to pee. He needed to get home and see that Vilda was alright and go to sleep and forget about the world. But Salander told him to sit still and shut up. She had one more thing to do. She rebooted and typed in some new commands. He realized to his horror that she was trying to hack into the prison’s computer system.
    “Don’t do it,” he said.
    “You don’t like the governor, do you?”
    “What?”
    “Me neither,” she said. And then she did something he did not want to see.
    She began to read Fager’s e-mails and files. And he just let her. Not only because he hated the prison’s governor, or because everything had already gone too far. It was the way she used the computer. It seemed like an extension of her body, an instrument she played like a virtuoso, and this made him trust her. Maybe it was irrational, he had no idea. But he let her keep going, launching new attacks.
    The monitor went black again, and once more those words: ACCESS GRANTED . What the hell? There on the screen he saw the corridor in the unit right outside. It lay still and dark. She played the same sequence of film several times, as if expanding it, or replaying a segment over and over. For a long while Olsen sat with his hands in his lap and his eyes closed, hoping that this agony would soon be over.
    At 1.52 a.m. Salander stood up abruptly and muttered “Thank you”. Without asking what she had done, he escorted her past the sally port gates back to her cell and wished her good night. Then he drove home and hardly slept – except for a short while just before dawn, when he dreamed about Benito and her daggers.

CHAPTER 4
17 – 18.vi
    Fridays were Lisbeth days.
    Once a week on a Friday afternoon Blomkvist went to visit Salander in jail. He looked forward to it, especially now that he had come to terms with the situation and stopped being so angry. It had taken a while.
    The prosecution and the verdict against her had made him furious. He ranted and raved on television and in the newspapers. But when eventually he realized that Salander herself did not care, he came to see her point of view. So long as