A couple of years after I met my beloved we travelled to her home country of Sweden. Her brother-in-law (sister's husband) is the equivalent of a Parks Ranger, he provides information to people who own properties which have forest on it and for which they are legally responsible. This is a great job because he got to know many of the local aristocracy and new-money owners of the local palaces and manor houses. He had recently broken his hand and was off work so he offered to drive us around for some sight-seeing.
Another couple of friends of my beloved (from Australia) were visiting at the time so all five of us set off to check out the lay of the land. We spent the day visiting the beautiful grounds of a number of fabulous old buildings. Naturally we took a bunch of photos (too many, probably!)
One of the houses in the middle of the tour was especially interesting because of its rich history. This manor house had been the family home of a woman who was the love of Herman Goering (one of Hitler's henchman, the one who, from memory, tried to escape Hitler by flying into Scotland - my beloved is keen to point out that this woman died well before the Second World War, otherwise she would not have let him fall in which such a bad crowd). The house was also previously owned by a great adventurer and the rooms were packed with his trophies, some quite politically incorrect - like the stuffed animals, and so on.
We know this because as we got close to the house it became clear that we weren't just going to look around the gardens, we were going to get to go inside. The owner of the time was very approachable and thought it fun to invite us in, possibly to practice her excellent Engligh. Right from the front doorway we knew we were in for something special, just inside the door was this enormous stuffed bear in a somewhat aggressive pose - we were told about the previous owner and how he had killed the bear himself. As we wandered through the house we were told a lot about the history.
Eventually we headed towards the library and here the house got a little strange. Swedish houses are not large like American (or Australian) houses. Even a manor house is not huge, although they are in comparison to the everyday person's. This means that rooms are compact and the floor plans don't have much wasted space - like corridors, for instance. On the way to the library we had to pass through a bedroom.
The house's owner stopped and told us about this room. Apparently, many guests who had been given this room to sleep in refused to sleep in it. The reason for this, we were told, was because of den vita damen or "The White Lady". The manor house was supposed to be haunted by this spirit and this room was where she most often manifested.
Earlier during our walk around we had asked the owner if we could take photos. She had smiled and told us that she did not mind. The two of us who had cameras asked again if she minded and she gave the same smile and told us to go ahead. We took a few photos in the room. In particular we took a few photos in a mirror, because I had a vague memory about some photos having images in mirrors.
Then we walked through to the library and heard the history of this room. The most interesting bit about here was that the dimensions of the house and the rooms in this part of it indicated that there was a hidden room. Because of the very strong Swedish heritage laws, no-one was allowed to damage the house to uncover the room and many people had tried to find out how to get into it but all had failed. We took some more photos and continued on our way. We spent the rest of the afternoon visiting more of the local sights.
The next day we put our photos in to be developed. As we were in the countryside, they had to be sent into the city for developing and took a week to get back. When they did I checked through them and noticed nothing strange about them. Then my beloved's friend asked me whether my photo from the mirror of the manor house had worked out.
It suddenly hit me. I had seen all the photos taken prior to that house and all the photos taken after that house were there, but not one photo from inside the house. There was a photo from outside the house, taken from about 100m away, but nothing from the ten or so photos taken inside. None of the half a dozen photos that my beloved's friend had taken inside that house had worked either. Before and after, no problem. It wasn't that they were too dark, or too fuzzy, they weren't there - they hadn't been printed. We pulled out the negatives and saw that all the photos up to the house were fine but every negative from inside the house was completely black.
A completely black negative would a completely white photo. The photos were not too dark, as you might expect if the house was dark (it wasn't) or the flash had failed (it hadn't), they were too bright - something for which we had no explanation.
About that time, I remembered what the owner had said when we had asked her if she minded if we took photos. She had smiled and said that she did not mind. At the time, I thought it was an accent thing, but afterwards I realised that she meant that she herself didn't mind if we took photos, but perhaps someone else might.