 In the annals of The Strange and the Incredible, the sources of our stories are often those professions which one would not normally associate with tales of the supernatural. One such source is photography. Yet from the realm of photographic experience comes a story that is no less startling than the others. It is a strange account of a camera and a corpse. It was not that Virgil Hoyt, a photographer's assistant in St. Paul, Minnesota, was dissatisfied with his chosen profession, but there was one aspect of the work which irritated him profoundly. He felt strongly on the subject of doing camera portraits of the dead. Consequently, whenever such a call came into the studio, he did his best to avoid being sent out. There was, for instance, that summer day in the year 1928 when the head photographer, one Mr. Wicked, found him sulking in the back of the shop. I thought you were due out at the fielding home at two, Hoyt? Yeah, I was, but... well, couldn't you go instead, Mr. Wicked? Aye, why should I? Well, it's another one of those deathbed jobs, and you know how I feel about him. I'm not interested in how you feel about him. You'd better get moving or you'll be late. It was a few minutes after two when Virgil Hoyt arrived at the fielding home. Hoyt followed Mr. Fielding through a dark corridor into a small sunroom at the rear of the house, and there stood a handsome casket. And in the casket lay Mr. Fielding's mother. She'd been an old woman, and unless he was greatly mistaken, a tyrannical one for even in a death. There was stubborn, unyielding expression in the counters of her face. Virgil Hoyt went quickly and competently to work. He exposed three plates and all. And then he returned to the studio and handed them over to the developer, quite content, that he'd done a capable piece of work. An hour later, Mr. Wicked, carrying the proofs in his hand, approached him angrily. Hoyt, I told you I wouldn't have you allowing your personal feelings to interfere with your work. But I didn't, Mr. Wicked. I did a good job at the fielding house. The best I could. Did you really? Well, take a look at these proofs. Hoyt seized the proofs and stared at them in blank amazement. The old woman's face was completely concealed. It was covered by a thick cloud-like veil. I don't understand this, Mr. Wicked. There must be something wrong with the camera. There's nothing wrong with the camera. I checked it myself. You deliberately fogged those plates, Hoyt. Now go on. Get out. You're through. So, Virgil Hoyt, bewildered and disconsolate, collected his belongings and prepared to leave the studio. But just as he approached the door to the street, it opened suddenly and Mr. Fielding, the son of that woman, stepped in. I've come to pay you for your work. You don't have to pay us, Mr. Fielding, until you get the pictures. Well, but you see, I decided that I don't want the pictures. I realized it sounds a little foolish, but I thought it all over and that it wouldn't be fair to my mother. How do you mean? She was a very strong-willed woman and the thing she hated above all else was to be photographed. She never had a picture taken in her whole life. Her spirit had been harboring near us. It would have done everything in its power to ruin those plates. It was then that Virgil Hoyt informed his client that the plates had been ruined, that though there had been no defect in the camera and though the dead woman had been clearly visible through the lens at the moment he took her picture, still, on the proofs, her face had been concealed by a heavy veil. In the minds of both of them arose the tantalizing question, could the old woman's iron will still have made itself felt even after death? It was the only conceivable explanation for this haunting mystery, a mystery incredible but true.