She grew suspicious, if not jealous. Then one day an anonymous letter came to her—signed 'Your Well-Wisher,' which corroborated her own uneasy thoughts—suggesting coarsely that her husband was chasing a vixen—not a fox.
No name was actually mentioned, but Mrs. Chesters realised at once who 'the woman' was.
She remembered noticing a young girl at an early meet held at the castle, who had attracted her attention by her air of breeding, beauty, and faultless seat on her mare. She had learnt that the girl was the daughter of an old yeoman farmer who lived on his farm, quaintly called 'The Bower,' far outbye on the moorland beside the Blackburn Lynn.
She had mentioned the matter to her husband, and asked him where the girl had acquired her good looks and her breeding. He had replied—and she thought now—with a slight uneasiness of manner, that Miss Todd came of a 'grayne' that had lived on the Border before ever the Normans came into the land, that by intermarrying with a few other ancient yeomen families a distinct and natural aristocratic type had resulted. 'Clean living, fresh air, and as much hunting as possible,' have all assisted. Nature also has assimilated the lines of her children's faces to the classical lines wind-chiselled of her great fells. Their oval faces, blue eyes, fair hair, and clean-chiselled features are her endowment.
'The Todds,' he had concluded with a laugh, 'have a tradition that they descend from Eylaf—one of the bodyguard of St. Cuthbert and his coffin—who, in a time of famine stole a cheese, and was for a time turned into a tod. The tod, or fox, is their totem, and him they diligently pursue.'
All that he had said then came back now with special meaning. Mrs. Chesters pondered deeply as to how she had best act in this conjuncture, and had not yet determined, when on the next afternoon she overheard a scrap of conversation as she was passing beside the stables.
She heard the head groom call to the stable lad to saddle a second horse and ride out to meet the Master on his way home from hunting that afternoon.
'Which way will I take?' asked the lad in reply.
'The Master rode the airt o' Ladiesdale,' the head groom had replied, for he was somewhat of a wag. Ladiesdale for Liddesdale! Mrs. Chesters fled; her cheek was burning, but her mind was made up.
She got out maps and discovered where 'The Bower'—ominous name—lay, and what tracks led thereto. Thither she would ride on the next hunting day and confront the girl, settle the matter with her husband, and put an end to his shameful intrigue at once.