Joslin de Lay has reached Oxford. It's a place riven by hatred and violence. Joslin senses danger but has no choice but to enter. He is taken into Doncaster College where he sings for the Masters and his supper. But Death has entered with him and throughout the dark cloisters and musty libraries, bodies are being discovered. Truly a little knowledge is a dangerous thing... 'It was like no plant Joslin - or even Gilbert with so many years behind him - had ever seen. They stood in the pouring rain looking down but fearing to touch.'What stood up from the earth was no plant. Joslin felt sick. Gilbert turned away. They saw a human hand, part of a body which must have been there for several weeks, buried next to the cursed mandrake.'