And slowly, the constriction left his throat. Something struck against his middle, almost knocking him down. Something pushed against his legs, backing him against the table. He looked down. His eyes were watery, his throat burning. The giant Pietro lay, breathing stertorously, at his feet.
A small hand grabbed his. "Father will come now," a voice said. "I don't—don't even know who you are, but I want to thank you. I thank you for myself and the Queen, and God, senor. You better come quickly, with us. Does it hurt much?"
Danny tried to talk. His voice rasped in his throat. The girl squeezed his hand and together with her and the drunken man who was her father, he left the tavern. The giant Pietro was just getting up and shaking his fist at them slowly....
It was a small top-floor room in an old waterfront building in the Spanish port of Palos. Or, Danny corrected himself, the Castillian port of Palos. Because, in this year of our Lord 1492, Spain had barely become a unified country.
"Are you feeling better, Martin Pinzon?" the beautiful girl asked him.
He had given the name he had heard, Martin Pinzon, as his own. The room was very hot. The August night outside was hot too and sultry and starless. The girl's father was resting now, breathing unevenly. The girl's name was Nina. One of the small caravels in her father's three-ship fleet was named after her. Her full name was Nina Columbus.
Nina brought another wet cloth and covered Danny's swollen throat with it. "Does it hurt much?" she said, and, for the tenth time, "we have no money to thank you with, senor."
"Any man would have—"
"But you were the only one. The only—never mind. Martin, listen. I have no right to trouble you, but ... it's father. Tomorrow is the second day of August, you see, and it is all over Palos that tomorrow he sails with the Queen's charter...."