“T. S. Eliot is the poet who wrote ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’! How can you be so ig—” Mrs. Muggeridge stifled a number of extremely rude endings to the sentence.

“Did he say anything else?” The tall man sounded bored.

“That was all I let him say. He was being disruptive, so I asked him to step out of class.” The shorter man’s upper lip suddenly jerked up in sneer, as if Mrs. Muggeridge had just confessed to doing something extremely stupid. It was all too much for her. “Now, would you please explain why all of this is important?”

“We don’t discuss ongoing investigations, ma’am.” The tall agent turned abruptly toward the door, rapping a pen against his mouth.

“Do you know anything about Dorian’s family?” The short agent twittered the question in a shrill, malicious tone. His eyebrows arched suggestively. The tall one swung back around, shooting what was obviously meant to be a quelling glance at his partner, but the little man only grinned.

“His family? No, I don’t. I think someone mentioned that he doesn’t live with his biological parents, but that isn’t so uncommon.”

“They’re dead, is why. Sister, too. They all died in June.” He seemed to enjoy the look of shock on Mrs. Muggeridge’s face. “Drowned.”

Mrs. Muggeridge felt her mouth fall into an O of dismay as the tall agent jerked his partner’s arm and towed him from the room. She stumbled a few steps to the sofa and flopped down, leaning her head on her hands. “Oh, that poor boy!” She gasped the words out loud. “Oh, no wonder he was so upset!”

It still didn’t explain why they were so interested, though. Not unless they thought Dorian was hiding something.

∗ ∗ ∗