Mad Barbara by Warwick Deeping

John Gore let his heart have its way that night, for the impulse in him was too strong to be withstood. Yet, like the cool and dogged man he was, he chastened the adventurous passion of a boy with the quiet hardihood of one who has learned to hold a rough ship's company in awe of him.

Unbuckling his sword, he thrust it into the grass under the tree, for the thing would only have cumbered him, and after drawing off his heavy boots and coat he went quietly to the bridge and across it to the court-yard gate. As on the night when he had waited there with Mr. Pepys, he could see a light burning in a window near the ground and the shadow of some one moving in the room within. Taking a couple of steps back, he made a running jump at the gate, and got his hands on the top thereof with hardly a sound to convict him of clumsiness. The rest was easy, and he straddled the gate and then dropped softly into the court-yard. His chief fear was lest the dog should hear him and give tongue. But there was not so much as the rattle of a chain to show that the beast was on the alert.