One Against the Moon Read Online Free PDF

few more minutes' search, the two men climbed back in their jeep and drove back to the barracks-grounds.
    Inside the rocket, Robin had been unable to hear what they had been saying. Their voices came to him heavily muffled and distorted and he could not recognize the words. He heard the man come up the scaffolding ladder and try the door. But it had been tight and it had not budged. Then he'd gone down and a little later Robin had heard the jeep drive away.
    Robin lay there quietly on the soft padding and wondered how long he should stay in hiding. They might have left a man on guard or they might be keeping an eye on the rocket. If he came out right away, they might spot him. Better wait here a half hour, he said to himself, and then tried to make himself more comfortable.
    The day had been a long one and a tense one. He was more tired than he'd thought. The tiny, cramped cubby-hole in the nose of the rocket was pitch-dark, cushioned, and utterly quiet. Robin rested his eyes. Before he knew it, he was sound asleep. The air was close and became stale; Robin's slumber slowly became deep and drugged.
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    The sun rose at five and with it there arrived the men who would load and launch the rocket—several truckloads in fact, with a couple of tanks of fuel. The volatile liquids were readied for pouring into the tanks and chambers of the first and main firing section. The engineers arrived. They began to check the loads and the preparations.
    "The instruments in place?" asked Major Bronck, who was in charge of this operation. His assistant, a civilian engineer, glanced up the ladder.
    "According to the notice up there, they are. I don't remember seeing them installed myself, though. May have been done after we left yesterday."
    "Who was in charge of them?" the major asked.
    "Jackson, sir," the answer came, "but he hasn't been in camp today. Must have been left overnight in town."
    The major frowned. "Well, I don't see the instruments around so I guess he loaded them all right. Sloppy way of doing things, though. I don't like it. In fact, I don't particularly like this whole job. It's too hasty, too irregular."
    The other smiled, shrugged. "Can't help it. Big rush orders from Washington. They wouldn't even let us put this shot off till Monday. Had to get a fast test on this atomic fuel. I guess it's another of those things they think the Russians are up to."
    "Ahh, that's always an excuse for rushing. But I still say haste makes waste. Well, anyway we've got our orders so off it goes this morning. Trackers on the job?"
    "Sure, they're right on it. But we've still got to load the animals. This is going to be a high flier and the space-medicine people want in on it. Here's their stuff now."
    A light truck rolled up and two men came out carrying a crate. One of the automatic rolling cranes lifted them all up to the nose of the rocket. There, just below the instrument compartment, they opened another port and installed their burden, shutting the compartment again and sealing it.
    The major glanced at his watch, looked around. The main chamber was loaded, the tank had departed. At his order, the rolling scaffolding was swiftly detached and driven away. Now the rocket stood alone on its own fins, pointing skyward into the pink and orange dawn, its side a dazzling white, its nose a bright red, each section banded in green.
    "How far do you think it will go?" the major asked his assistant.
    "Anybody's guess," was the reply. "The fuel is untested and unpredictable. If this trick fuel fails to work, the whole thing will go up maybe six miles and then drop. If the atomic stuff turns into a bomb they'll hear the bang in Las Vegas. If it works as they expect, it might go up several hundred miles, maybe even more. It could make a better satellite rocket than the ones we've got up already. In fact that's what they're hoping. They think they may be able to make this the start of a real space-platform program—for once carrying a pay load up