, will you? I know you haven't got any duplicates of the VX-3
ready, no rescue rocket...."

Dan listened a moment longer then broke in roughly. "Oh, for Pete's
sake, will you stop crying over me, sir? So I get mine here. I might
have gotten it over Berlin, too. Forget it--sir."

Dan grinned suddenly. "Look, what have I got to kick about? I'll go out
in a flash of glory--at least one headline will put it that way--and
I'll get credit in the history books as the man who discovered that
Earth has _two_ moons! What more could I ask, really?"

Dan blushed at the reply from Rough Rock. "Will you lay off please,
Colonel? How else should a man take it? I'm still scared silly inside.
But, look, I've really got something to report now. This little runt
moon makes tracks around Earth in probably two hours minus. If I
remember my Spacenautics right I'm already looking down over the Grand
Canyon, heading west. I'm going to get a pretty terrific bird's-eye view
of the whole world in two more hours, which is just about how much
oxygen I've got left.... Lucky, eh?"

Dan looked down, watching in fascination the majestic wheeling of the
Earth below him. His little moonlet did not rotate, or rather it rotated
once for each revolution around Earth, as the Moon did, keeping one face
earthward, giving him an uninterrupted view. The Sierras on Earth hove
into clear view and the broad Pacific. There would follow Hawaii, then
Japan, Asia, Europe.... No, he saw he was slanting southwest. It would
be across the equator, past Australia, perhaps near the South Pole, then
up around over the top of the world past Greenland, following that great
circle around the globe. In any case, his was the speediest trip around
the world ever made by man!

"Before we're out of mutual range, Rough Rock, I'm going to explore this
new moon. Me and Columbus! Stand by for reports."

Dan did his walking in huge leaps that propelled him fifty feet at a
step with slight effort, due to the extremely feeble gravity of the tiny
body. What did he weigh here? Probably no more than an ounce or two.

"Nothing much to report, Colonel. It's a dead, airless pip-squeak
planetoid, just a big mile-thick rock, probably. No life, no vegetation,
no people, no nothing. Guess you might call me the Man in the Second
Moon--and the joke's on me! Well, one and three-quarter hours of oxygen
left, by the gauge, or 105 minutes--sounds like more that way.... What's
that, sir? Your voice is