Over 300 fund management executives were in attendance at the ‘2011 S&P Fund Awards’ luncheon. The luncheon was about to wrap up in the function room and I was at the Poolbar on the direction of Mr. Berlingo.
This exclusive function may have had formalities resulting in the ‘Fund Manager of the Year’ award, but the consequence of gathering such a powerful group of people together was clear: the accumulation of more funds and planning its allocation. The connections made over poached quail at lunch and drinks at the pool bar afterwards have shifted the flow of funds as not planned before Friday last week. Capital fathers children of more capital, and the family just got bigger for some in attendance.
Berlingo asked me to deliver a package when I met him at his Aurora Place office.
The instructions included: “wait at the Poolbar for a gentleman named Francis to exit the awards function and come up to the bar. Wear a dark blue open-neck collared shirt and put a pen behind your ear, periodically using it to jot down notes in a horse racing form-guide. Francis will recognise you. He’ll order a Peroni and strike up a conversation."
Waiting for Francis to arrive, I made myself comfortable sitting at the bar. The bar staff had few other customers, and to amuse my time I did my best to be the most interesting thing they had to play with.
Courtney, blonde with big shiny eyes, turned out to be more interesting than anything I had to offer. I stumbled through her questions about my faux interest in horse racing as we chatted. But a benefit of that was my comment, “you have big beautiful eyes,” and I paused then said with a grin, “like a horse!”
Courtney blurted a laugh and said “thanks! I think.”
I followed up with, “so are you a career bartender or is this just paying the bills?”
She said she’s on the roster at Ivy between an honours degree in neuropsychopharmacology, and then asked for a test, “go on, name a drug and I’ll give you an explanation.”
“Hmm, marijuana,” I replied.
“Something more difficult,” she said with a disapproving look, “everyone knows about weed.”
“Ok, how about methadone.”
“Well, that ends in ‘one which means it’s a drug that supresses pain receptors in the body,” she explained.
Our encounter was halted when Francis came up to the bar as planned. He ordered a Peroni and a vodka lime Soda, then said, ”form guide hey, better odds than the sharemarket these days.” and he continued, “a mates horse is running at Toowoomba tomorrow, mind if I have a look?”
“I’m finished, it’s all yours,” I replied, as I handed Francis the form guide. Inside was the package from Berlingo – a letter, thick with several pages, and what felt like a key and plastic card.
“Thanks mate,” Francis replied. He pulled out a wallet with gold American Express Card from his blue pin-striped Armani suit and asked Courtney to start a tab, then turned to me, “what are you drinking? I’ve got your next one.”
“Cheers, thanks... Peroni,” I replied, secretly hoping a free beer wasn’t what Berlingo had in mind as ‘potentially lucrative.’
My job was done, my beer still half full and another one was on the way. Looking around the pool bar it was easy to see that beauty is common, but suffice to say I was being won over by Courtney's sparkling beauty plus killer intelligence – a lethal combination. Perhaps a conversation about her expert knowledge in chemistry of the brain would ignite chemistry of our own.
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