Epilogue

The flight back to London was uneventful. I wanted to get back quickly to Scotland, so given that it had been a very early morning flight from Moscow, I decided that we’d make the drive from Gatwick back to Edinburgh the same day.

The M25 wasn’t complete yet, so we had to go through central London (fortunately it was a Sunday) to get to the M1 for the drive north. We finally arrived at my flat in Stockbridge around 7 PM, and had started to decompress in the company of a bottle of Bell’s when there came a knock on the door.

I greeted the two Edinburgh cops somewhat warily – police at my door on a Sunday night was a new thing for me. They asked me if I was me, and I was, then they suggested I might want to fetch a coat and a toothbrush as I would likely be spending the night away from home. Huh?

I asked why, and they said the guv’nor will explain. I told my visiting American friend to help himself to the booze, then accompanied the polis down to the Black Maria (aka paddy wagon) in which I was transported through the dark city streets to the city jail (gaol in Scots) which was located in medieval arched-ceiling rooms underneath the Criminal Courts, which at the time were in the old Parliament Hall opposite St. Giles Cathedral in the Old Town. I still had no idea why I was being arrested.

I was escorted to the booking desk, where I was informed that I was being detained under section blah blah blah of the Blah Blah (Scotland) Act of 19-blah blah, for failure to pay… parking citations.

“Say what? I’m getting arrested for not paying parking tickets?”

“Aye, that’s what it says here,” he replies, referring to a sheet that includes the names of other wanted arch criminals.

I want to ask more questions but am moved aside to make room for some drunk. It seems that the Edinburgh cops sweep the Grassmarket and Cowgate on Sunday nights to house the drunks that congregate in those areas. While I’m watching, a person who I assume is the jailer (based on the big ring of skeleton keys he’s holding – really) passes. He is a victim of kyphosis. He’s a hunchback. I’m not making this up – either.

Now, in fairness, the charge is probably righteous. Over the previous year I’d been working on my thesis, which required that I spent a lot of time in the National Library of Scotland. I tended to drive my car there ‘cause I’m very lazy, and then I’d get caught up in the research and forget that the meter was about to expire. There might also have been some times when I parked near some pub or other and got carried away with my research there, too. So I can’t say I’m outraged by the fact that I had a lot of parking tickets. I’d paid off quite a number, but you had to do that in person and it was a nuisance. But getting arrested?

Anyway, the standoff ends when I muse openly about phoning the American consulate (really) and the booking officer allows me to post twenty quid as bail pending my appearance the next morning at the Burgh court. Done, and I’m driven home in the same vehicle that brought me. The day which began in the USSR ends with me as a bad guy out on bail.

The next morning I stand in front of a judge, wig and all, who asks me about my evil ways. I have a handful of receipts for tickets I’d paid, but there’s nothing on the receipt tying it to any one ticket (poor bureaucrats, the Scots) so which ones I’d paid vs. which ones I’d ignored can’t be determined. The judge shakes his wig and asks if it seems like a hundred pounds might be a warranted penalty, and I agree, and my days of incarceration are passed.

It could have been worse. It could have been the Lubyanka.