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her disguise as a boardinghouse maid helped her
rate a group of bank robbers, Isabella Goodwin (1865-
became the first woman to serve as a detective for
New York City Police Department Unusual for the time,
mother of four regularly worked undercover to expose
minals, and in 1915, she was called 'the best known
ale sleuth in the United States." This fictional account is
ed on her true story.
The Maid
bella sat before the vanity, daubing her
ush in a saucer of soot, and leaned in close
the mirror to smudge the dull gray across
r cheekbones. Not too much-you didn't
ant to look like a character in a Broadway
elodrama, merely one of the nameless
orkers who toiled at the kitchen stoves and
How does the flashback describing Isabella's
first assignment affect the passage as a whole?
It implies that Isabella's work as a detective is
affecting her relationship with her daughter.
It explains the reason why Isabella is disguising
herself and reveals that she has done it before.
It suggests that Isabella's disguise may once have
been comical but is now deeply serious.
It foreshadows the idea that today Isabella may be
disguising herself for the last time.