“No, stay,” said Tina, but I interrupted.
“Yeah, that’d be great,” I said loudly, “whatever they have, thanks.” I didn’t mention that there were servers circulating even now with flutes of bubbly, I just wanted the brunette all to myself.
“Oh sure,” giggled Millie, running off, “Have fun you two.”
Hopefully that meant she wasn’t coming back, she’d give us a little privacy, and I turned back to the brunette.
“So what brings you here?” I growled, expecting some casual banter, some slick story about how she loved vacationing in the Mediterranean on her private yacht, the skies so blue, the sea so calming.
But instead, the girl didn’t really say, instead dodging the question.
“Just wanted to see what this is about,” she murmured, not meeting my eyes. “You know, mix and mingle a little.”
Odd. Usually people love talking about themselves, it makes them feel important. But evidently this brunette was more circumspect.
“You been to St. Venetia before?” I asked casually. My country is like another Monaco, with Formula One racing, fashion shows, and casinos galore. But the girl looked away in the distance again.
“Yeah, I was here when I was a little girl, it was fun,” she said, taking a deep breath and shooting a wry smile, “but I haven’t been back in a long time.”
And another bell went off in my head because St. Venetia is a playground for the rich, a resort on the Italian shore. Wealthy people around Europe come here to see and be seen, so I was surprised that someone at finishing school didn’t come regularly. Weren’t these girls from well-off families? It’s like a saying you’ve never been to the South of France, never experienced St. Tropez in the summer.
“Well, where do you usually vacation?” I asked curiously. “Where does your family summer?”
And the girl took a deep breath before answering casually, too casually.
“My family likes to stay put, we’re homebodies most of the time, and when I travel, I’m usually doing charity work. I did a program last summer in Romania, working with the Roma people. It was cool,” she said.
I kept my expression neutral but was internally surprised. Charity work? Hell, most women I knew never got their hands dirty, much less helped those less fortunate. So intrigued, I pressed on.
“What kind of charity work?” I asked curiously. “We’ve got some Roma people in St. Venetia too.”
The girl nodded.
“The Roma, or gypsies as a lot of people call them, are a dispossessed group who’ve been persecuted for thousands of years,” she said carefully. “They were originally nomads, traveling in caravans throughout Europe but lately a lot of them have been pressured to settle down by various governments,” she said carefully. “As a result, they’ve kind of become a ghettoized population, pushed to the fringes of society, living in impoverished circumstances.”
This I knew. Roma have been around a long time, they’re part of the European family now despite their origins in India. But I was curious as to Tina’s role.
“And what did you do with your program?” I asked, “Did you cook meals, help with laundry, look after kids, that kind of thing?” I asked. I admit, it was a little condescending but she must have been what? Twenty maybe?
But the girl looked at me frostily.
“For your information, many Roma are successful entrepreneurs, they often open businesses like bodegas, restaurants, child-care facilities, you name it. A lot of them just need some start-up capital to get going, or some working capital to expand, so that’s where my program comes in. We provide loans to disenfranchised folks who otherwise have no way of accessing capital.”
“You mean microfinance?” I asked surprised. This was a hot topic in the economic development sphere, something that I’d encountered during my duties as Crown Prince. “You’re in the microfinance space?”
“Yeah, kind of,” the brunette acknowledged. “Not exactly microfinance because our loans are bigger. Microfinance usually implies loans of a five hundred dollars or less, like what Grameen did in Bangladesh, but we can do loans up to fifty thousand, so it’s more like small business lending.”
Now I was seriously impressed. I’d been expecting another batch of bimbos, girls who knew nothing about the world around them, heck, probably not even their own countries. But this girl was different. She had some serious smarts, citing Grameen in Bangladesh, the difference between microfinance and small biz lending, heck even start-up capital. I wanted to know more, a lot more, so I pulled out my trump card.
“You know, I’m the Crown Prince of St. Venetia. Maybe I could help you out, hook you up with some connections,” I offered casually.
Most girls melt the minute they hear the phrase Crown Prince, turning into big puddles, but the brunette was different. She paused for a moment, looking me straight in the eye.
“Thank you,” she said evenly, “I’m sure Roma Outreach would be grateful for your patronage and I’d be happy to put you in touch. Like I said, I worked for them last summer so I’m not there anymore, but I know people who’d love to hear from you.”
And I nodded. The girl was a professional. As with any non-profit, you never want to turn away any offers of help, especially from a rich and powerful donor. But that didn’t get me closer to my goal.
“What are you up to nowadays if you’re not with them?” I asked curiously.