Sentence Correction

Isotopes in the recently excavated bones of a 14-year-old girl from the Jamestown archaeological site indicate she had eaten a high-protein diet, so was probably the daughter of a gentleman, not a maidservant.


A) she had eaten a high-protein diet, so was probably the daughter of a gentleman, not a maidservant.

B) that she ate a high protein diet, so probably had been the daughter of a gentleman, and not a maidservant.

C) that she had eaten a high protein diet, so was probably the daughter of a gentleman, and not a maidservant's.

D) she ate a high-protein diet, so was probably the daughter of a gentleman, and had not been a maidservant.

E) she had eaten a high-protein diet, thereby had probably been the daughter of a gentleman, not a maidservant's.

OA: A
Source: Veritas prep question bank

My question: Why do we need past perfect in the correct version of the sentence? We do not have two events in the past here? The girl can't eat something before she was the daughter of someone. That's just nonsensical to me. Experts, please explain.

Hi,There is a little relation between the two events.
The sentence wants to stress on the fact that only rich people can eat high-protein diet.

I have another question - Indicate that is correct idiom but the answer choice A is missing this structure.

Also I feel C and E are eliminated for the reason of parallelism.

...the daughter of...is not parallel to maidservant's.

Experts please help.This question was raised few months back but we didn't hear any expert comments.

I agree with aaggar.. Shouldnt indicate be followed with that?