Sometimes when they came to get him and take him down to the basement it was light outside, sometimes it wasn’t. Sometimes he was able to sleep as long as he liked; at other times they were shaking him awake from a groggy trance. His treatment on the way to and from the basement grew rougher and rougher, but the questioning itself was always coldly, meticulously precise and courteous. “May we ask who is employing you, Mr. Clermont?” “Could you tell us the whereabouts of the letter, Mr. Clermont?” “Could you describe your activities during the two hours before dawn on Sunday, Mr. Clermont?” Usually it was LeSueur asking the questions; occasionally it was another, older officer he did not know. On what he thought was his third morning in the Tower, one of the sentries deliberately pushed him down half a flight of stairs. He landed at the bottom, slightly stunned, and looked up to see the sentry staring down at him with no expression on his face whatsoever. He was wise enough not to say anything about it to LeSueur, nor did he react in any way when the same sentry came to collect him at the end of the session.
