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This story came form the book: Kitsune, Japan's fox of Mystery, Romance and Humor. By Kiyoshi Nozaki. I have the PDF file of this book and it has some very interest Kitsune stories in it. This one in particular is very interesting.
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There was a giant camphor tree in the wood with its branches spreading in all directions darkening the sky. This tree was widely known as the Camphor Tree with Innumerable Branches. Chie-No-Kusunoki. There are many poems referring to the wood and the camphor tree. For instances, Minamoto-no-Toshiyori, a famous poet at the time, sings:
O cuckoo of Shinoda wood
Singing in the month of May
Filling each branch of the camphor tree
With her melody, sweet and gay!
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Kuzu-No-Ha, or the Fox-Wife of Shinoda Wood, is a 5-act play of the fox marrying a young samurai of good family out of gratitude and love.
In the Reign of the Emperor Murakami (926-967), there lives a samurai called Abe-Yasuaki in Settsu Province, and his son is Yasuna by name.
To save the life of a young fox, Yasuna, on his way to the Shinoda Shrine in the wood, Fights with Tsunehira, a military commissioner who is hunting foxes to obtain their livers for his wife suffering from an incurable disease, on the advice of his brother Doman, an astrologer.
Yasuna sustains several wounds and a charming girl comes along and takes him home. (She is, in reality, the saved fox.)
Yasuaki, Yasuna’s father, coming for the rescue of his son, is killed by Tsunehira, the military commissioner. A retainer of Yasuaki, In puruit of the killer, finds the wicked man in front of the house of the charming girl. Yasuna comes out and avenges his father by killing Tsunehira.
After the Incident, Yasuna lives with the girl, whose name is Kuzu-no-Ha (Arrowroot-Leaf) . Later they are blessed with a child, a very intelligent boy.
When the boy is 7 years old, his mother, the charming woman, while feasting her eyes on the chrysanthemums in rapture, reveals her natural shape, an old fox, by showing the end of the tail. The child sees it. Therefore she feels regret for it-so deeply that she disappears, after leaving the following parting odeon a paper sliding-door:
If you love me, darling, come and see me.
You will find me yonder in the great wood
Of Shinoda of lzumi Province where the leaves
Of arrowroots always rustle in pensive mood.
Yasuna goes to see the woman in the wood taking the child along with him.
Presently. the fox makes its appearance. The fox, Yasuna now learns, is the deity of the Shinoda shrine. The fox gives the child a casket called Ryugu-no-Hako, or the Casket of the Sea Gocl's Palace, with which one can tell the meaning of the language of birds and beasts.
It is now 3 years later. You will see the child of 10, with the dignified name of Seimei, who has become famous by beating his opponent, Doman, in the contest of astrology held in the lmperial palace. The Emperor confers the degree of Doctor of Astrology on Sbimki, who becomes the greatest astrologer in the latter part of the 10th century, winning the favor of the Emperor Kazan and the Emperor Ichijyo.
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So this Story/Play appears to be talking about Abe-No-Seimei It may be just me assuming too much but the clues say as thus.
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