Mary Roberts Rinehart

“ The car went to the bad again at Wynton, and he and Barney tinkered with it until two-forty. They got it in shape to go back to the barn, but that was all. Just as they were ready to start, a passenger got on, a woman, alone: a small woman with a brown veil. She wore a black dress or a suit—he was vague about everything but the color, and he noticed her especially because she was fidgety and excited. Half a block farther a man boarded the car, and sat across from the woman. Barney said afterward that the man tried twice to speak to the woman, but she looked away each time. ”

“ I affirmed. "She committed suicide from an Omega ferry boat and she's at the morgue this morning."
"Bully," he returned. "Keep on; you'll get lots of clues, and remember one will be right."
It was not until noon, however, that anything concrete developed. In the two hours between, I had interviewed seven more people. ”

“ The man got out when the car went into the barn, but the woman stayed on. He and Barney got another car and took it out, and the woman went with them. She made a complete round trip this time, going out to Wynton and back to the end of the line down-town. It was just daylight when she got off at last, at First and Day Streets.
Asked if he had thought at the time that the veiled woman was young or old, he said he had thought she was probably middle-aged. Very young or very old women would not put in the night riding in a street-car. ”