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A historical enthusiast takes cover from rain during celebrations on the Charles Bridge in Prague.Petr David Josek/The Associated Press

It started with an open window.

It was a damp, chilly November day, with one of those evenings that seems wrapped in perpetual twilight. I had just checked into the Augustine, a luxury hotel housed in a 13th-century monastery hidden away in the labyrinth of streets that is Prague's Lesser Town. Aware that I was researching the property for an upscale magazine, the front-desk staff had upgraded me to the Tower Suite, which stretched over three floors. The individual spaces were connected by a twisting, 40-step staircase.

Feeling smug that I had scored such a great suite, I surveyed the lovely living room with a smile and then, one floor up, took in the over-the-top marble bathroom that featured a deep tub, all on its own, standing in the middle of the room. Finally I came to the bedroom on the top floor, its windows displaying a 360-degree vista of this grand and historic city.

I briefly trekked back down to the living room to send a couple e-mails, then returned to further enjoy the view. And that's when I noticed the window – just a small square on the side facing the Vltava River. It was open. It had not been open just a few minutes prior.

A chill – unrelated to the cold air seeping in – ran down my back. The smug smile disappeared. Someone had opened that window, I thought – yet I was the only person in the room. Closing it while shaking my head, I decided the wind must have blown it open. Or something. Certainly, the explanation didn't have to be supernatural.

Jet-lagged and eager for an early night, I readied for bed. Knowing I would probably have to traverse down the staircase in the middle of the night, I left on a dim light in the shower. As I drifted off to sleep, I heard a few dull, thumping sounds downstairs, but wrote it off as an old building settling on its foundations.

A few hours later, I plodded down to the bathroom. The second my feet hit the cold marble, I knew something was not right. Another light was on. A pale glow ringed the shaving mirror, the arm of which was now, by the work of someone – something – pulled out to its full length. The chill again ran down my back.

In the morning, I took the matter up with a front-desk clerk. As I told my story, his eyes darted furtively around the lobby. "Usually it's not that suite," he said, sotto voce. He noted a couple other rooms that the housekeepers preferred not to enter – places where guests often reported sudden, unexplained drops in temperature, or feeling a strange presence.

He offered up a different room, but I decided to stay put; I had plans to use that beautiful bathtub. The night passed without incident, and the next day I was ensconced in the suite, meeting a deadline. Late in the afternoon, I climbed the steps to the bedroom – and found the window open again.

Enough is enough, I decided, pushing it shut and heading to the lobby. I agreed to change rooms after all, and a young – visibly nervous – bellman named Milos accompanied me back up, noting that he feared ghosts but frequently had to walk the halls in the wee hours as night watchman. When we reached the bedroom, I pointed out the window.

Milos tried to open it – but it was sealed shut. At that moment, all of the lights in the room went out. Was whatever force that had hit the switch unhappy at my departure? I gushed a cold sweat as I groped hurriedly through the darkness, tossing my clothes into my suitcase. Milos carried the bag down the precarious, twisting steps while I lit the way with a small flashlight. Once at the bottom he tried a central electrical panel, but for several minutes was unable to get the lights back on.

When he eventually did, the two of us ventured upstairs one last time to ensure I had not left anything behind. And that's when I saw it: the mirror. It was pulled out again, and lit – a situation, Milos agreed, that had not existed just a few minutes before. A final farewell, perhaps, from my unseen roommate in the Tower Suite.

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