Read Online The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye: Continuing Stieg Larsson's Millennium Series by David Lagercrantz - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: David Lagercrantz
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seeing all the people in the audience and once or twice she even found herself moved, for no apparent reason.
After the debate there were questions, and somebody in the auditorium asked why it was that, whenever men establish a religion, it is always the women who end up suffering. Hassan Ferdousi answered rather darkly:
“It is deeply sad when we use the greatest being of all as an instrument for our own smallness.”
She was reflecting on those words as people around her got to their feet. A young man in jeans and a white shirt came towards her. She was so unused to meeting a boy her own age without wearing a niqab or hijab that she felt naked and exposed. But she did not run away. She remained seated and observed him discreetly. He was around twenty-five years old and not especially tall, and although he did not look confident, his eyes shone. There was a lightness in his step which contrasted with the serious, even sombre look about him, and he also seemed shy, which she found reassuring. He addressed her in Bengali.
“You’re from Bangladesh, aren’t you?” he said.
“How can you tell?”
“I just know. From where?”
“Dhaka.”
“Me too.”
He smiled so warmly that she could not help smiling back. Their eyes met and her heart leapt. Afterwards all that Faria could recall was how they strolled out onto Sergels torg, talking quite openly from the outset. Before they had properly introduced themselves he was telling her about the blog he had contributed to in Dhaka which promoted free speech and human rights. The bloggers had ended up on Islamists’ hit lists and had been targeted for murder, one after the other. They were butchered with cleavers, and the police and the government did nothing, “absolutely nothing”, he said. And so he had been forced to leave Bangladesh and his family, to seek asylum in Sweden.
“Once when it happened, I was right there. My best friend’s blood was all over my jumper,” he said. Even though she did not fully understand, at least not then, still she sensed a sorrow in him which was greater than her own, and she felt a closeness which she should not reasonably have been able to feel on so brief an acquaintance.
His name was Jamal Chowdhury. She took his hand and they wandered towards Riksdagshuset. She was having difficulty swallowing. It was the first time in ages that she had felt completely alive. But the feeling did not last long. She became anxious and imagined Bashir’s black eyes. When they reached Gamla Stan she went her own way. But during the days and weeks that followed she sought comfort in the memory of their meeting. It was like a secret treasure chamber.
Hardly surprising then that she clung to it in prison, especially on this evening just before the freight train came thundering by. With Benito’s footsteps approaching, Faria knew in her whole body that this time would be worse than ever.
Olsen was in his office, still waiting for a call from Fager. But time passed and no call came. He swore under his breath and thought about his daughter. Olsen was scheduled to be off today with Vilda at a football tournament in Västerås, but he had cancelled everything because he did not dare to be away from the unit. When he asked his aunt to babysit for the umpteenth time he felt like the worst father ever, but what was he to do?
His efforts to have Benito transferred had backfired. Benito knew all about it and glared threateningly at him. The whole place was seething. Everywhere the prisoners were whispering to each other as if there was about to be a major clash or breakout, and he, in turn, looked pleadingly at Salander. She had promised to deal with the situation, which worried him as much as the problem itself, and he had insisted that he would attempt to resolve it first. Five days had now passed and he had achieved nothing. He was scared to death.
Still, there was one positive outcome. He had believed he would have to face an internal
After the debate there were questions, and somebody in the auditorium asked why it was that, whenever men establish a religion, it is always the women who end up suffering. Hassan Ferdousi answered rather darkly:
“It is deeply sad when we use the greatest being of all as an instrument for our own smallness.”
She was reflecting on those words as people around her got to their feet. A young man in jeans and a white shirt came towards her. She was so unused to meeting a boy her own age without wearing a niqab or hijab that she felt naked and exposed. But she did not run away. She remained seated and observed him discreetly. He was around twenty-five years old and not especially tall, and although he did not look confident, his eyes shone. There was a lightness in his step which contrasted with the serious, even sombre look about him, and he also seemed shy, which she found reassuring. He addressed her in Bengali.
“You’re from Bangladesh, aren’t you?” he said.
“How can you tell?”
“I just know. From where?”
“Dhaka.”
“Me too.”
He smiled so warmly that she could not help smiling back. Their eyes met and her heart leapt. Afterwards all that Faria could recall was how they strolled out onto Sergels torg, talking quite openly from the outset. Before they had properly introduced themselves he was telling her about the blog he had contributed to in Dhaka which promoted free speech and human rights. The bloggers had ended up on Islamists’ hit lists and had been targeted for murder, one after the other. They were butchered with cleavers, and the police and the government did nothing, “absolutely nothing”, he said. And so he had been forced to leave Bangladesh and his family, to seek asylum in Sweden.
“Once when it happened, I was right there. My best friend’s blood was all over my jumper,” he said. Even though she did not fully understand, at least not then, still she sensed a sorrow in him which was greater than her own, and she felt a closeness which she should not reasonably have been able to feel on so brief an acquaintance.
His name was Jamal Chowdhury. She took his hand and they wandered towards Riksdagshuset. She was having difficulty swallowing. It was the first time in ages that she had felt completely alive. But the feeling did not last long. She became anxious and imagined Bashir’s black eyes. When they reached Gamla Stan she went her own way. But during the days and weeks that followed she sought comfort in the memory of their meeting. It was like a secret treasure chamber.
Hardly surprising then that she clung to it in prison, especially on this evening just before the freight train came thundering by. With Benito’s footsteps approaching, Faria knew in her whole body that this time would be worse than ever.
Olsen was in his office, still waiting for a call from Fager. But time passed and no call came. He swore under his breath and thought about his daughter. Olsen was scheduled to be off today with Vilda at a football tournament in Västerås, but he had cancelled everything because he did not dare to be away from the unit. When he asked his aunt to babysit for the umpteenth time he felt like the worst father ever, but what was he to do?
His efforts to have Benito transferred had backfired. Benito knew all about it and glared threateningly at him. The whole place was seething. Everywhere the prisoners were whispering to each other as if there was about to be a major clash or breakout, and he, in turn, looked pleadingly at Salander. She had promised to deal with the situation, which worried him as much as the problem itself, and he had insisted that he would attempt to resolve it first. Five days had now passed and he had achieved nothing. He was scared to death.
Still, there was one positive outcome. He had believed he would have to face an internal
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