I am not dipping my toes into politics. I am saying that early because politics is like glitter. Once it gets on you, people find it in your hair for weeks. I am not here for flags, factions, manifestos, television panels, constitutional futures or any man in a suit saying “let me be absolutely clear” while making things foggier than a Highland lay by in November.
I am here because a woman is being asked how she did not notice the shopping.
That is a subject I understand.
Peter Murrell, the former chief executive of the SNP, has pleaded guilty at the High Court in Edinburgh to embezzling £400,310.65 from the party. Reports say the money went on large items, including vehicles, but also watches, pens, electronics, kitchen goods, coffee machines, mugs, books, curry sauce, glue and instant coffee. He is due to be sentenced on 23 June. Nicola Sturgeon has said she had no knowledge or suspicion that personal items had been bought with SNP funds.
Now, I am not here to say what any wife knew. I am not a judge. I am not a detective. I do not have a notebook, a torch and a young constable waiting by the back door. I am merely a woman who has lived in a house long enough to know that a Jura coffee machine costing nearly £4,000 does not simply appear on a kitchen counter without someone asking questions.
At that price, I would have required a family meeting.
“Are we expecting the King?”
“Have we won the lottery?”
“Is this machine also doing the ironing?”
“Bloody hell, why does it cost so much but only make two cups at a time?”
“And why, before buying anything, was I not asked whether it came in pink?”
I am here because the domestic imagination cannot help itself.
A husband comes in carrying a bag.
“What’s that?”
“Nothing.”
Nothing is never nothing. Nothing has a receipt.
“What’s in the bag?”
“Just a few things.”
There it is. The phrase that has bankrupted many a household.
“What few things?”
“A pen.”
“We have pens.”
“Not like this one.”
“If it writes in English, we have pens.”
Now, I have seen the reported price of one of the pens and I must say, at that level, the pen should not merely write. It should write, proofread, publish, win the Booker and make soup.
People say a wife might not notice. Perhaps. Life is busy. People have jobs, meetings, emails, crises, hair appointments, bad news, and cupboards they no longer open because something inside has shifted.
But a mother in law would notice. A mother in law notices a new coaster from the driveway. You could bring a £3,500 wine coaster into a house under cover of darkness, wrapped in brown paper, hidden under a sleeping Labrador, and a mother in law would appear at the kitchen door saying, “And what’s that meant to be?”
“It’s a coaster.”
“For whose wine? The Pope’s?”
That is why mothers in law are not invited to enough financial audits. They have the gift. They can see through carrier bags. They can hear credit cards sweating. My late mother in law could identify unnecessary spending by smell. She would walk into a room, pause, narrow her eyes and say, “There’s been a purchase.”
Not “Hello.” Not “How are you.” Just straight to the crime.
Once, my husband bought a new torch and tried to pass it off as something we had always owned.
She looked at it for two seconds.
“That torch is not from this family.”
So when I hear that a household may contain new watches, electronics, coffee machines, mugs, books, glue, curry sauce and instant coffee without anyone noticing, I do not think politics. I think: where was the mother in law?
Nine out of ten Scottish mother in laws will see the coffee machine, touch it, then ask what was wrong with the kettle.
And there is no answer to that.
“What was wrong with the kettle?” is not a question. It is a verdict.
Then the mugs arrive.
Mugs are another matter. No household needs more mugs. Every household in Scotland already has enough mugs to serve tea to a ferry queue. There are the good mugs, the chipped mugs, the Christmas mugs, the mysterious corporate mug from a place nobody worked, and one huge mug used only by someone who says they are “just having one cup,” which depletes all the hot water from the kettle.
If a man brings mugs into a house, the first question is not “how much were they?” It is “where do you think they’re going?”
Because cupboard space is not theoretical. Cupboard space is marriage.
Then there is curry sauce. I keep coming back to the curry sauce, and I know I should rise above it. I have tried. I made tea and looked out the window in a statesmanlike manner.
Still curry sauce.
There is something about curry sauce in a £400,000 embezzlement case that makes one pause. This is the first clue that difficult economic times have now reached every social class in Scotland.
Glue is worse. Glue is never innocent. Glue means something has broken and someone has decided not to tell you. In domestic life, glue is the first sign of concealment.
“What happened to the lamp?”
“Nothing.”
“Why is there glue?”
“The lamp has always had structural issues.”
And instant coffee. Instant coffee is a cry for help even when bought legally.
I am not a judge, so I shall leave the embezzlement to the court. But instant coffee feels like a separate offence against the social order. There are limits, even in a fallen age. I can almost hear the household conversation.
“Why have we got instant coffee?”
“For emergencies.”
“What emergency requires instant coffee?”
“The kind where the proper coffee machine is being investigated.”
There is no need for me to take a political side. Domestic life has provided all the material. The real question is not about one party. It is about the great mystery of partners and purchases. Every long marriage contains a zone of uncertainty. A husband may own cables no one understands. A wife may own creams described as “essential” when they are clearly lotions with French ambitions. There may be a box in the spare room labelled Christmas that contains Easter decorations and a tax bill from 2008. Marriage survives because both parties agree not to inspect everything.
But, I’m just saying… if my husband came home with a motorhome, I would notice.
If he said, “It’s not ours,” I would ask why it was in the drive.
If he said, “It’s for party business,” I would ask which party required sleeping quarters, a kitchenette and upholstery.
If he said, “Don’t worry,” I would immediately worry in three languages.
And if he said, “You never saw it,” I would say, “Of course I saw it. It is a bungalow on wheels, not a digestive biscuit.”
This is where I have sympathy for any woman who says she did not know. Not because I know what happened. I do not. But because men are capable of running entire secret logistical systems while being unable to find the mustard in the fridge. I have seen a man hide Christmas presents in the loft for six months and then ask where we keep the sellotape. I have seen a man own duplicate tools because he could not find the first tool in the drawer labelled tools. I have seen a man come back from the shop with everything except the one thing written on the list in capital letters.
So yes, perhaps a great deal can happen under one roof. Especially if one person is busy running a country and the other is apparently running a branch of John Lewis through the accounts.
But still.
Still.
There comes a point when a house stops being a home and becomes an evidence locker.
