Thursday, February 20–Friday, March 7


During the last week of February Salander acted as her own client, with Bjurman, N., born 1950, as a high-priority special project. She worked almost sixteen hours every day doing a more thorough personal investigation¹ than she had ever done before. She made use of all the archives and public documents she could lay her hands on. She investigated his circle of relatives and friends. She looked at his finances and mapped out every detail of his upbringing and career.
The results were discouraging.
He was a lawyer, member of the Bar Association, and author of a respectably long-winded but exceptionally tedious dissertation² on finance law. His reputation was spotless. Advokat Bjurman had never been censured³. On only one occasion was he reported to the Bar Association—he was accused nearly ten years ago of being the middleman in an under-the-table property deal, but he had been able to prove his innocence⁴. His finances were in good order; Bjurman was well-to-do, with at least 10 million kronor in assets. He paid more taxes than he owed, was a member of Greenpeace and Amnesty International, and he donated money to the Heart and Lung Association. He had rarely appeared in the mass media, although on several occasions he had signed his name to public appeals for political prisoners in the third world. He lived in a five-room apartment on Upplandsgatan near Odenplan, and he was the secretary of his co-op apartment association. He was divorced and had no children.
Salander focused on his ex-wife, whose name was Elena. She was born in Poland but had lived all her life in Sweden. She worked at a rehabilitation⁵ centre and was apparently⁶ happily remarried to one of Bjurman’s former colleagues. Nothing useful there. The Bjurman marriage had lasted fourteen years, and the divorce went through without disputes.
Advokat Bjurman regularly acted as a supervisor⁷ for youths who got into trouble with the law. He had been trustee for four youths before he became Salander’s

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