It is the prosecution's contention, me lud, that the people before the court this morning violently and without provocation disrupted flight 297 out of London Heathrow bound for Miami, threw drinks over innocent fellow passengers, assaulted in-flight attendants and obliged the pilot to make an emergency landing in the Azores, where the accused were finally subdued by Marines under Lt-Col Dominques, RIP.
That much is relatively clear, me lud. The identity of the people before the court is not, alas, quite so transparent. Take the blonde lady on the left of the dock, with the Lycra leggings and an ample display of bare abdomen. She checked in at Heathrow airport under the name Mary McDonagh. But she appears to have been travelling in the seat earmarked for Mary Ward, the seat going to Mary Ward apparently being occupied by Mary Conors.
Deep waters
Now might I, and with the utmost respect and, be it added, regret, draw your lordship into deep waters. The three Marys - reading from the left, one two, three, before you in the court, me lud, all of them with that rather fetching blond hair, running to a darker hue as it approaches the scalp, and identifiable by the colour of their leggings, day-glo pink for Mary McDonagh (as she was known when she made her appearance in this tale), day-glo orange for Mary Ward beside her, and dayglo purple for Mary Conors beside her - these three Marys, I say to you, me lud, are in fact sisters, married to brothers.
Should I stop, me lud? You appear to be unwell. Perfectly understandable, me lud. I have had the papers on this case for several weeks now, reading them every night, and am not the better for them yet. Though one might not applaud the ladies for their dress sense, perhaps you feel a warm debt of gratitude that they are colour-coded?
Me lud, I must regretfully tell you that such gratitude would be misplaced - for inasmuch as the ladies share the same first name, it is their habit to share their clothing too; and on flight 297, it was Mary McDonagh who was wearing the day-glo purple, Mary Ward the day-glo pink, and Mary Conors the dayglo orange.
But I fear I am confusing you with these Marys. Perhaps I could crave your lordship's indulgence by, with no little relief, addressing the issue of three of their fellow accused - the three ladies beside them, who are not wearing the day-glo leggings just mentioned, but are adorned with rather rather tight-fitting body stockings. You will note their colours, me lud - day gloorange, day-glo pink and day-glo purple, so similar to the garments worn by the other Marys.
The other three Marys?, I hear you ask, or rather, I sense you ask, as you clutch your brow and hammer your head on your desk. It is with infinite regret, me lud, that I must tell you that these three other ladies are also called Mary, that they are also sisters, that their hair is coiffed by the self-same stylist responsible for the first three Marys, and that their surnames are also Ward, McDonagh and Conors. Well might you tremble, me lud, for I fear you have foreseen the inevitable outcome of this part of the narrative. They too are sisters.
More sisters
But let me hasten to add, they are not the sisters of the first three Marys! No indeed, let me further hasten to add, somewhat joyfully, they do not even share the same home as the first three Marys - well, not often, that is. These three Marys are in fact the sisters-in-law of the first three Marys I had the rare privilege of introducing to the court some moments ago. That is to say, they are sisters to Patrick Ward, Patrick McDonagh and Patrick Conors, who are the husbands of the first three Marys.
I see you blanching, me lud. It is indeed a trying case. Let me try you a little further, if you feel strong enough. Patrick Ward is in fact the brother of Patrick McDonagh, and they are brothers to Patrick Conors. This is a complex arrangement, and you might indeed feel unnecessarily complex, but it is the practice of the families concerned to foster out their children to one another: a Ward child will often go to a McDonagh household, for example, and a Conors to the Wards.
Naturally, this leads you to believe that a Conors in a Ward household becomes a Ward. Oh, would that it were so! It is the usage amongst these families to give a fostered child the name of a third party; so that a Ward staying with a McDonagh is called a Conors. And so on and so forth.
This explains why the three men you see in the dock before you, Patrick Ward, Patrick Conors and Patrick McDonagh, are less, rather than more, likely to be of the stock which their surnames suggest. Though this is a generalisation which, as in all such matters, only goes so far; that is to say, Patrick Ward there, though by birth a McDonagh, and by foster-parentage a Conors, is in fact fully half a Ward on his mother's side. That is, his mother's father was a Ward; on the other hand, his father was on his mother's side himself half a Ward as well, by which token Patrick Ward is indeed well named. He is preponderantly a Ward, though not patronymically (in the conventional sense) a Ward at all.
Easiest identity
I mention that Patrick Ward, centre right in the dock at this moment, because his is, amongst the men anyway, the easiest identity to discover and retain; for his brother Patrick McDonagh has been fostered by all three families, and alas, the identity of his original parents has been lost in the confusion. As it has been for the Patrick Ward, Patrick Conors and Patrick McDonagh alongside the first three gentlemen who have the great good fortune to share those names, all of whom - it is my contention - started the affray on flight 297.
What, me lud? Why not simply deport them all to Ireland and be done with it? Not possible, me lud, not possible. All the defendants, me lud, are British with British passports to prove it! And a credit to Britain, I make no doubt. Now, as I was saying . . .