in a Georgia drawl.

"Not a bomb," the postal worker agreed.

"Okay, let's open it."

The red silk wrapper was carefully removed, revealing a black leather

attache case.  There were no markings, not even a manufacturer's name or

model number.  Instead of a combination lock, both latches had inserts

for a key.

Gerhart tried the latches simultaneously.  They both unsnapped.

"The moment of truth," he said with a cautious gun.

He placed his hands on each corner of the upper lid and slowly lifted

until the case was open and the contents in view.

"Jesus!" Gerhart gasped The  security  agent's  face  went  white  and

he  turned  away.

The postal worker made gagging noises and staggered for the lavatory.

Gerhart slammed the lid shut.  "Get this thing over to George Washington

University Hospital."

The security agent couldn't reply until he swallowed the acid-tasting

bile that had risen in his throat.  Finally he coughed, "Is that thing

real or is this some kind of Halloween trick or treat?"

"It's genuine," said Gerhart grin-dy- "And believe you me, it ain't no

treat."

In his White House office, Dale Nichols settled back in his swivel chair

and adjusted his reading glasses.  for perhaps the tenth time he began

scrutinizing the contents of a folder routed to him by Arrnando L6pez,

the President's Senior Director Of Latin American Affairs.

Nichols gave off the image of a university professor, which indeed he

had been when the President persuaded him to switch his sedate campus

classroom at Stanford for the political cesspool of Washington.  His

initial reluctance had turned to amazement when he discovered he had a

hidden talent for manipulating the White House bureaucracy.

His thicket of coffee-brown hair was parted neatly down the middle.  His

old-style spectacles, with small round lenses and thin wire frames,

reflected a plodding temperament, a neversay-die type who was oblivious

to everything but his immediate project.  And, finally, the ultimate in

academic clichds, the bow tie and the pipe.

He lit the pipe without removing his eyes from the articles clipped from

Mexican newspapers and magazines dealing with only one subject.

Topiltzin.

Included were interviews granted by the charismatic messiah to officials

who represented Central and South American countries.  But he had

refused to talk to American journalists or government representatives

and none had penetrated his army of bodyguards.

Nichols had learned Spanish during a two-year tour in Peru for the Peace

Corps, and easily read the stories.  He took a legal pad and began

making a list of claims and statements that came to light during the

interviews.

1. Topiltzin describes himself as a man who came from the poorest of the

poor, born in a cardboard shack on the edge of Mexico City's sprawling

garbage dump, with no idea of the day, month or year.  Somehow he

survived and learned what it was to live amid the stink and flies and

manure and muck of the hungry and homeless.

2. Admits to no schooling.  History from childhood, until his emergence