Oh Bertiekins, how stupid are we?

IT’S 1993 and the then finance minister and his life partner are enjoying a romantic night in at St Luke’s.

Their dinner trays clank awkwardly together as the couple perch on the side of the bed (the boudoir famously being the only room in the building Bertie Ahern has control over).

As Bertie puts the brown sauce bottle down to open a Bass can, the lovebirds begin to chat.

“Did you have an interesting day Celia?”

“It’s funny you should ask Bertiekins, because yes I did. I bought a house!”

“No! Imagine that, you being my life partner and all and not telling me. My clever little Fluffyhun is certainly full of surprises! Where did you get the money? A building society like normal people?”

“Oh Bertie, you do make me laugh! No, I got £30,000 from the Fianna Fáil funds of your Drumcondra constituency. You know, the one you dominate like Fidel Castro dominates Cuba?”

“Get outta town! Wow! I didn’t know a thing about that at all. Isn’t that incredible?!”

Yes, it is incredible — as in, it is not credible. In fact, it is truly unbelievable.

Imagine if it emerged yesterday afternoon that Gordon Brown’s ex-girlfriend, while dating him, had borrowed his constituency Labour Party’s funds, with virtually no paperwork, to buy a house and only paid the sum back 15 years later, when a tribunal started sniffing round. And that he denied he knew anything about the deal until she turned up one day with the deeds.

Does anybody seriously think he would still be Prime Minister of Britain today?

And that is just one strand of the at times grotesque, often unbelievable, always bizarre, but sadly not unprecedented saga we know as Bertiegate. The slippery way the facts have to slide out is perhaps the most damning element of this unedifying spectacle.

Mr Ahern first referred Thursday afternoon to a “party worker” benefiting from a £30,000 withdrawal from one of the 23 bank accounts connected to him by the tribunal. It was to help three elderly relatives of the worker who feared their rented house would have to be shared with strangers once it was sold.

Mr Ahern must surely have known it was only a matter of time until the “party worker” was identified as his then life partner, so why not just say it?

Even after he was forced to — literally — spit out her name, the Taoiseach still insisted the money had not gone to Ms Larkin, but to a solicitor for a vendor.

Technically true, but the tortured manipulation of the facts puts the rosiest of glosses onto events.

The upshot was the house was then legally owned by his partner, with 75% of the loot coming from FF funds. But Mr Ahern insists he knew nothing about it until everything was signed and sealed.

How stupid must Mr Ahern think the people of this country are?

As the name of the “party worker” was finally prised out of the Taoiseach’s mouth — like a Rottweiler might unwilling release human flesh — virtually every jaw was fighting for floor space, after dropping so far, so fast.

It was the second dynamite moment in just over an hour, following the dramatic transformation of Judge Mahon from Judge Dreary to Judge Dread.

Yes, the softly spoken, pacific mannered gentleman — to use a legal term — went off on one yesterday. After simmering for years, Mount Mahon finally erupted.

Judge Dread was passing sentence and that sentence was “Back off buster, if you know what’s good for you!”.

He denounced Mr Ahern’s lawyer for branding the tribunal judges “crooks and criminals” who seduced innocent public figures with their “twisted, illegal, corrupt frolic”.

Though as frolics go, it did sound quite an exotic one. You could just imagine the advertising if Alan Mahon was touting for business. “Roll up, roll up for Judge Dread’s magical mystery tour! Step this way for the legendary Twisted, Illegal, Corrupt, Frolic — a snip at just €300 million!”

So spent was he after laying waste to the Taoiseach’s legal team, Judge Dread ordered a 10-minute recess.

Throughout the tirade, Bertie sat slumped forward with his head in his left hand. He must have thought things couldn’t get much worse. An hour later, Celia’s house came up — and things did.