Enzo Moretti

Enzo Moretti is 51 and has been selling stones for thirty years, between Turin and Antwerp, with the case in one hand and the smile in the other. He was born in Turin, the son of a neighborhood jeweler who taught him to look at a gem against daylight, never against the light of the counter. He went to Belgium at 21, came back, went again, and says he no longer knows which city he sleeps better in.

In Antwerp he occupies an old hotel room near the station, with a heavy curtain, a worn rug and a small Italian aluminum coffee pot that he carries in his suitcase wherever he goes. He makes his own coffee in the morning and offers it to whoever is around. He says that in Italy a man without coffee is a man without manners. He talks about his son in Milan and his two girls in Turin, and shows the photos without anyone asking.

His black hair is combed back, with gray strands at the temples, and he has a short, well-trimmed beard and a finely cut navy-blue suit with a white shirt and no tie. He speaks softly, mixes in Italian words, and flatters the detective before answering anything, with the patience of someone who has negotiated for a long time. He tends to call the person he is talking to caro and to repeat their name three times per conversation.

About the weekend, his account is simple: he spent it in Turin with his wife and the girls, and took the train back this morning, when he heard about the robbery at the station, as shocked as anyone. He says he has kept an office in the building for almost two years, because Antwerp is the heart of the stone trade and whoever wants to beat to the right rhythm has to live near the heart.

Ask him where the stones are and he answers that if he knew, he would be counting his own. It may be the humor of a merchant used to laughing at his own bad luck. It may be the charm of someone who always has a line ready. The detective will have to decide which.