ves.

The Pinta and the Santa Maria came up alongside. All thoughts of pursuit
were gone. Columbus waved. He was very close now on the deck of the
Santa Maria. There was something in his face, something changed.
Columbus was a new man now. He had been shamed. He had followed his
daughter and Martin Pinzon across an unknown ocean and he was changed
now. Somehow, Danny knew he could now make voyages on his own.

"Martin," Nina whispered. "They may say it was father. But it was you.
I'll know in my heart, it was you."

Danny nodded. She put her arm around his shoulder, and kissed him. He
liked this slim girl--he liked her immensely, and it wasn't right. She
wasn't his, not really. She was Martin Pinzon's. He let the Spaniard
come to the surface, willed his own mind back and down and away. She's
all yours, Pinzon, he told the other mind in his body. She--and this
world. I'm a--stranger here.

But once more he kissed Nina, fiercely, with passion and longing.

"Goodbye, my darling," he said.

"Goodbye! What--"

He let Martin Pinzon take it from there. "Hello," said Martin Pinzon.
"I mean, hello forever, darling."

She laughed. "Goodbye to your bachelorhood, you mean."

"Yes," he said. "Yes."

But it was Martin Pinzon talking now. Completely Martin Pinzon.

He was back in his grand-uncle's basement. He was in the trunk and he
felt stiff. Mostly, his right arm and the right ribs felt stiff. He felt
his shirt. It was caked with blood.

Proof, he thought. If I needed proof. What happened to Pinzon happened
to me.

He stood up. He felt weak, but knew he would be all right. He knew about
Columbus now. At first, a weak drunkard. But after the first voyage,
thanks to Martin Pinzon and Nina, an intrepid voyager. For history said
Columbus would make four voyages to the New World--and four he would
make.

Danny went outside, to where the lawyer was waiting for him. The trunk
was Danny's now, the time trunk. And he would use it again, often. He
knew that now, and it was wrong to deflate a dream.

Columbus was a hero. He would never say otherwise again.

THE END

Transcriber's Note:

This etext was produced from _Amazing Stories_ October 1956.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and
typographical errors have been corrected without note.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of My Shipmate--Columbus, by