The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo Trilogy Bundle by Stieg Larsson Page B

you. I’m too old for that. If you don’t like what I say, you can tell me to jump in the lake. Then I’ll have to find someone else to work with me.”
    â€œOK, tell me what this job involves.”
    â€œHow much do you know about the Vanger family?”
    â€œWell, only what I managed to read on the Net since Frode called me on Monday. In your day the Vanger Corporation was one of the most important industrial firms in Sweden; today it’s somewhat diminished. Martin Vanger runs it. I know quite a bit more, but what are you getting at?”
    â€œMartin is … he’s a good man but basically he’s a fair-weather sailor. He’s unsuited to be the managing director of a company in crisis. He wants to modernise and specialise—which is good thinking—but he can’t push through his ideas and his financial management is weak too. Twenty-five years ago the Vanger concern was a serious competitor to the Wallenberg Group. We had forty thousand employees in Sweden. Today many of these jobs are in Korea or Brazil. We are down to about ten thousand employees and in a year or two—if Martin doesn’t get some wind into his sails—we’ll have five thousand, primarily in small manufacturing industries, and the Vanger companies will be consigned to the scrap heap of history.”
    Blomkvist nodded. He had come to roughly this conclusion on the basis of the pieces he had downloaded.
    â€œThe Vanger companies are still among the few family-held firms in the country. Thirty family members are minority shareholders. This has always been the strength of the corporation, but also our greatest weakness.” Vanger paused and then said in a tone of mounting urgency, “Mikael, you can ask questions later, but I want you to take me at my word when I say that I detest most of the members of my family. They are for the most part thieves, misers, bullies, and incompetents. I ran the company for thirty-five years—almost all the time in the midst of relentless bickering. They were my worst enemies, far worse than competing companies or the government.
    â€œI said that I wanted to commission you to do two things. First, I want you to write a history or biography of the Vanger family. For simplicity’s sake, we can call it my autobiography. I will put my journals and archives at your disposal. You will have access to my innermost thoughts and you can publish all the dirt you dig up. I think this story will make Shakespeare’s tragedies read like light family entertainment.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œWhy do I want to publish a scandalous history of the Vanger family? Or why do I ask you to write it?”
    â€œBoth, I suppose.”
    â€œTo tell you the truth, I don’t care whether the book is ever published. But I do think that the story should be written, if only in a single copy that you deliver directly to the Royal Library. I want this story to be there for posterity when I die. My motive is the simplest imaginable: revenge.”
    â€œWhat do you want to revenge?”
    â€œI’m proud that my name is a byword for a man who keeps his word and remembers his promises. I’ve never played political games. I’ve never had problems negotiating with trade unions. Even Prime Minister Erlander had respect for me in his day. For me it was a matter of ethics; I was responsible for the livelihoods of thousands of people, and I cared about my employees. Oddly enough, Martin has the same attitude, even though he’s a very different person. He too has tried to do the right thing. Sadly Martin and I are rare exceptions in our family. There are many reasons why the Vanger Corporation is on the ropes today, but one of the key ones is the short-termism and greed of my relatives. If you accept the assignment, I’ll explain how my family went about torpedoing the firm.”
    â€œI won’t lie to you either,” Blomkvist said.