Only Harry Winston and a diamond polisher were in the room with Grasseley when he placed the diamond on the table. He carefully inserted the edge of the knife into the notch and, holding his breath, he rapped the knife with an iron bar. The only sound was the ring of the bar on the knife.
The Vargas didn’t split. In that instant Adrian Grasseley felt only numbness. His calculations had been wrong.
Winston grabbed the stone and examined it under a magnifying glass. He saw at the point of the V-notch a small fracture in the stone. It wasn’t deep. But it was straight and true along the grain as Grasseley had planned.
Winston handed the stone back to Grasseley. “Strike it harder,” he said. “It’s all right.” It was a decision which could cost him a fortune but he had confidence in the gray-haired man beside him. Winston had seen Grasseley involuntarily soften the blow when he struck the knife with the iron bar and he could understand the fear that must have gripped him.
Again Grasseley placed the knife in the V and struck it with the rod. The fracture deepened. And when he struck the third blow, the Vargas split cleanly without even the loss of a fragment of the stone.
Winston heaved a sigh of relief, and when he looked at Adrian Grasseley he saw that the little diamond cutter was crying. The reaction to the weeks of strain had been too much.
The story of the Vargas diamond is only one among thousands of stories of suspense, excitement, glamor and intrigue in the world where diamonds fire the imagination of men and women and form the basis for a giant industry. And because the diamond trade is big business, it becomes the concern of the Customs Bureau.
The Vargas entered the country through one of the most unusual workshops in all the country, located in the nondescript, sprawling Customs building on Varick Street in lower Manhattan. The door to this room is never left unlocked. No one is permitted to enter the room unless he carries a pass or has special permission.
The reason for the extraordinary security is that the room is one of the most important clearing points for diamonds in all the world. It is the workshop of the Customs experts whose job it is to appraise the value—and determine the duty—on the diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and other precious and semi-precious stones which are brought into the United States.
Approximately $75 million worth of cut and polished diamonds enter the United States each year, along with $75 million to $100 million worth of rough diamonds and other precious stones. Each shipment of cut and polished diamonds—with few exceptions—must pass through the obscure little room presided over by Chief Examiner Leroy N. Pipino, a slender, dark-haired, young-looking man who maintains a remarkably detached view toward the treasures that are spread before him each week. In the past ten years, Pipino has appraised diamonds worth more than $1 billion.