The sun climbed, slowly, until it hung overhead, ending a morning which had lasted seven earth days in length. At midday the shadows had all but vanished. He finished marking the last of three crosses and stepped back to survey his work. He read the names at the head of the mounds: Max Prochaska, Gordon Nagel, Otto Richter. Each was followed by a date. Out on the plain were other graves, those of the crewmen of Bandit and Red Dog. He had marked each mound with a small pile of stones. Later it struck him that someday there might be peace. Someday, someone might want to look at one of those piles of stone. He returned and added a notation to each. * * * * * The sun moved imperceptibly across the sky. It seemed to hover above the horizon for a long while before slipping beyond the rim. Night seemed eternal. Crag worked and slept and waited. He measured his oxygen, rationed his food, and planned. He was tough. He'd survive. If only to read Gotch off, he promised himself savagely. The sun came up again. In time it set. Rose and set. Crag waited. * * * * * He watched the silvery ship let down. It backed down slowly, gracefully, coming to rest on the ashy plain with scarcely a jar. Somehow he didn't feel jubilant. He waited, gravely, watching the figures that came from the ship. He wasn't surprised that the first one was Colonel Michael Gotch. * * * * * Later they gathered in the small crew room of the Astronaut, the name of the first atom-powered spaceship. They waited solemnly--Gotch and Crag, the pilot, and two crewmen--waiting for the thin man to speak. Just now he was sitting at the small pulldown chow table peering at some papers, records of the moon expedition. Finally he looked up. "It seems to me that your Nation's claim to the Moon is justified," he said. The words were fateful. The thin man's name was Fredrick Gunter. He was also Secretary-General of the United Nations. * * * * * Jeff Sutton, although experienced in journalistic and technical writings, has only recently turned his hand to novels with the result that _First on the Moon_ is also his first novel. A native Californian, and a Marine veteran, he is presently employed as a research engineer for Convair-San Diego, specializing appropriately enough for this novel in problems of high altitude survival. He says of himself: "I have long been a science-fiction reader (a common ailment among scientists and engineers). On the personal side, a number of factors have coalesced to pin me to the typewriter. I am living in--and working in--a world of missiles, rockets, and far-reaching dreams. In many areas the border between science-fiction and science suddenly has become a lace curtain. It is a world I have some acquaintance with--and fits very nicely into my desire to write."