First on the Moon

ACE BOOKS, INC. 1120 Avenue of the Americas New York 36, N.Y.
FIRST ON THE MOON
Copyright ©, 1958, by Ace Books, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Printed in U. S. A.
To Sandy
The four men had been scrutinized, watched, investigated, and intensively trained for more than a year. They were the best men to be found for that first, all-important flight to the Moon—the pioneer manned rocket that would give either the East or the West control over the Earth. Yet when the race started, Adam Crag found that he had a saboteur among his crew ... a traitor! Such a man could give the Reds possession of Luna, and thereby dominate the world it circled. Any one of the other three could be the hidden enemy, and if he didn't discover the agent soon—even while they were roaring on rocket jets through outer space—then Adam Crag, his expedition, and his country would be destroyed!
One of the rockets was silver; three were ashen gray. Each nested in a different spot on the great Western Desert. All were long, tapered, sisters except for color. In a way they represented the first, and last, of an era, with exotic propellants, a high mass ratio and three-stage design. Yet they were not quite alike. One of the sisters had within her the artifacts the human kind needed for life—a space cabin high in the nose. The remaining sisters were drones, beasts of burden, but beasts which carried scant payloads considering their bulk.
One thing they had in common—destination. They rested on their launch pads, with scaffolds almost cleared, heads high and proud. Soon they would flash skyward, one by one, seeking a relatively small haven on a strange bleak world. The world was the moon; the bleak place was called Arzachel, a crater—stark, alien, with tall cliffs brooding over an ashy plain.
Out on the West Coast a successor to the sisters was shaping up—a great ship of a new age, with nuclear drive and a single stage. But the sisters could not wait for their successor. Time was running out.