In Guards We Trust

  ***

  When Jason walked into the warehouse the next day he was amazed to see that almost all of his sailors had turned up. They cheered his arrival enthusiastically. The more observant amongst them noticed that Jason was struggling to hold back a few tears. In the end only forty two out of the sixteen hundred men decided to accept Jason’s offer of a pay-out. A significant number of the men, however, made no secret of the fact that the princess had won them over with her charm, her beauty and the force of her personality. Many of them declared that no Frenchman would lay a hand on her crown whilst they were alive.

  The official announcement of the engagement between Jason and Renate received mixed reactions. Most of the Montugan noble families were delighted. They speculated that if France were to renounce the treaty and were to attack Montuga, Jason’s small fleet would now doubtless side with Montuga. Despite such speculation, considerable steps were taken to prevent most Montugans from coming to learn about the refit program. All the additional gun ports were skilfully disguised so as to appear indistinguishable from the remainder of the hull. The changes fooled most, but not all the Montugans.

  Amongst the ordinary citizens of Montuga, those of Italian background generally approved of the engagement. The engagement was not particularly popular amongst all those of French background. Some opposed the engagement simply because they opposed the monarchy, whilst others objected to the princess marrying an Englishman or to her marrying a Protestant, or both. Jason at least took some comfort in the fact that few, if any, of the French speaking Montugans had any experience of or interest in naval matters. This made his task of hiding the extent of the changes to his fleet from them considerably easier. He also ensured that his ships were often out of port, as one would expect of vessels tasked with the prevention of piracy. When they were in port, they were always anchored on the far side of the harbour behind other large merchant ships.