Cripples Day at Shrewsbury attracts a multitude of pilgrims and soon a body appears in a leather sack in the middle of the pilgrims. Brother Cadfael sets out to discover how and why the man was killed.
Brother Cadfael, a crime-solving monk in medieval Shrewsbury, investigates the murder of a prospective bridegroom in which another contender for the hand of the same lady is a suspect.