Matthew Bartholomew, doctor of medicine and fellow of Michaelhouse, Cambridge, is traveling with a party from the college to accept the gift of a parish church in Suffolk. But when the benefactor begins to unduly rush the deed to legalize the transfer, Bartholomew senses that Suffolk is not the tranquil retreat that he had been led to believe. And when Michaelhouse's student priest is found murdered in the church that was to become his living, Bartholomew realizes that he and his party are threatened by dark forces within the village. Compelled to investigate, he descends into a nightmarish world of superstition and heresy.
