"What about me?" asked Bob.
"Not a word. The fact is, I forgot all about you. I didn't mention you, neither did the admiral."
"Out of sight out of mind," remarked Bob. "But I'm delighted to hear it, for now that I'm used to this cockle-shell's little eccentricities I'm perfectly at home. Is there any chance of your going into action?"
"Every chance, I should think. I fancy we're going to have another slap at the enemy."
"The whole fleet, you mean?"
"No I don't. I've an idea the admiral wants to see how we mosquitoes can sting. Feel jumpy?"
"Not in the slightest. There's nothing I'm more anxious to see."
"Well, it may be pluck, but I call it sheer ignorance. Here we are in mid-ocean, a mere egg-shell—you know that; but we've enough explosives in our magazines to send half London sky-high, and a single fortunate shot plumping into us would separate us all into our elementary atoms."
The desired order came sooner than was expected. Late in the afternoon of Wednesday, March 9, Admiral Togo signalled two divisions of destroyers to approach Port Arthur, the one division to watch the entrance while the other laid mines at various points along the coast. The former duty was allotted to Captain Asai's division. Darkness had fallen, and the sea was rolling high, when the two flotillas, followed at a considerable distance by a couple of cruisers, broke off from the rest of the fleet and steamed northwards towards Port Arthur. On the Kasumi there was none of the orderly bustle of clearing for action that Bob had observed on the Mikasa. A destroyer must always be ready. The ward-room and the warrant officer's mess were fitted up as hospitals for wounded; the trolley for bringing torpedoes from the magazine under the turtle-back deck to the tubes aft was tested along the rails; Yamaguchi had a short colloquy with the engineer; and then he went to his place on the fore-bridge, confident that all was right.
The flotilla opened up the lights of the port about midnight. The presence of the boats was soon discovered by Russian scouts, for at irregular intervals the guns of the forts tried long-range shots at them. Within a few miles of the port the divisions separated, the second steaming straight for the harbour, where it proceeded to lay mines from the mouth of the channel along the coast towards Dalny. Captain Asai's three vessels meanwhile cruised off the Liau-ti-shan promontory.