ASHINGTON - Inside the package, along with the videotape and the plain-paper note, was a half-inch stack of documents with a piece of advice:
During the debate, take a new tack on Mark Twain's adage about the weather in New England. Try something along the lines of, if you don't like Al Gore now, just wait a minute. He'll change.
Reading the words, and glancing across his conference room at a TV showing a tape of George W. Bush in a mock debate with New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg, Tom Downey knew on Sept. 13 he wasn't holding a package, but a political hand grenade.
Someone had mailed the former New York congressman, who was helping Gore prepare for the presidential debates, some of Bush's preparation materials.
In a sense, the package had started ticking at 10:28 a.m., when the receptionist at Downey's Washington-based government relations firm, the Downey McGrath Group, signed for the US Postal Service Express Mail envelope at the front desk.
Eager to duck any political fallout that might come his way, Downey quickly passed the package over to his lawyer, who gave it to the FBI hours later.
Now, 21/2 weeks later, it threatens to explode, as Gore and Bush prepare for their first debate Tuesday at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. Conspiracy theorists are sharply divided about who would suffer the damage.
Does the Gore campaign have a mole inside the Bush camp, someone who has access to some of the campaign's most sensitive information?
Did the Bush team engage in a most Machiavellian of plots, trying to entrap the Gore team by secretly sending Downey material he wasn't supposed to have?
Was the Bush camp being betrayed by some of the Democrats who, this time around, were helping the Republican cause?
Did a Gore do-gooder offer up the material, unbeknownst to either side, only to face the unpleasant reality of FBI agents on his - or her - trail?
The case has become Washington's new parlor game, as well as a point of contention between the campaigns. Its outcome could provide a true October Surprise, the oft-anticipated but rarely realized last-minute development that can change the course of an election.
''Somebody knows, and the person who finds that person is going to be the hero of this,'' said Marc Miller, Downey's lawyer and the person who triggered the investigation by phoning the FBI.
The receptionist who received the package handed it over to Kathy McLaughlin, Downey's executive assistant. She opened it and took it to the office of Downey, who was to play Bush in mock debates with Gore and was with three associates at the time.
The outer covering was a red, white and blue, rip-resistant Postal Service Express Mail envelope. The name of the sender read, ''Amy Smith,'' but the return ''Austin Road'' address turned out to be fake. The postmark read Sept. 11, from Austin, Texas, site of the Bush campaign headquarters.
According to Miller, Downey took the tape down the hall and slid it into a VCR in a conference room. As it whirred, he started to flip through the materials that accompanied it.
There was a cover sheet, an unsigned message on plain paper reading to the effect of, ''Here's some material that might be helpful to you. I'll call in a few days to see if you need anything else.'' The rest of the materials were similarly typewritten on plain white paper, with no letterhead or identifying features.
As he read, Downey looked up at the TV screen. There were Bush, Gregg, and a moderator he didn't recognize. Downey didn't know the details, but it turned out to be a scene from this summer, when Bush practiced at his ranch in Crawford, Texas.
''He immediately stops the tape and pulls it out of the VCR and decides to stop looking at both it and the papers,'' recalled Miller. Downey did not return a message seeking comment. ''He then decides that they are not his and he shouldn't have these things.''
About 10:40 a.m., Downey and McLaughlin called Miller, who has been the firm's corporate attorney since 1993. Downey told the attorney what he had received and the two discussed what to do. About two minutes later, Downey called back, asking Miller to come to his office immediately.
Downey placed a call to Gore headquarters in Nashville, Tenn., looking for campaign chairman William Daley. He was in a meeting, so Downey was connected with a campaign lawyer. He told the lawyer what had happened, according to Miller, and that he was getting rid of the package.
When Miller arrived, Downey was putting the tape and papers back into the envelope. ''I want this out of my office; you take it,'' Miller recalled his client saying. The two were also noting times, anxious to avoid allegations that someone copied that materials while they were in Downey's possession.
''We decided that the best place for us to deposit this stuff was with the FBI,'' Miller said.
While Miller was at Downey's office, Daley called back. Downey told him what had happened and what they were going to do; Daley seemed to be in agreement.
Downey also said he wanted to step aside from any further debate preparations, to shield Gore from any criticism that he may have gained an unfair advantage.
Downey also called Gore's deputy campaign manager, Mark Fabiani. In turn, Fabiani decided to give the Associated Press a minute-by-minute chronology, in an effort to spread the word and inoculate the campaign against allegations of a dirty trick. Daley called Donald Evans, chairman of the Bush campaign.
Miller arrived back at his office about 12:15 p.m., placing the package in a filing cabinet outside his office door. He then picked up the phone book and called FBI headquarters.
Agents arrived at Miller's office in late afternoon, taking possession of the package at 4:32 p.m. They then went to Downey's office, where they interviewed him, McLaughlin and the receptionist.
Bush aides initially sought to verify the authenticity of the material. Once they did, they started to blame the Democrats.
''It appears that whoever obtained the tape did so in some sort of unethical way,'' Karen Hughes, Bush's communications director, said Sept. 15. ''The only people who would have access to that tape were the most senior members of our campaign.''
They were identified as Bush, Hughes, and Evans, as well as campaign manager Joe Allbaugh, political strategist Karl Rove, policy chief Josh Bolten, and media strategist Mark McKinnon.
The focus on the Gore team appeared to gain credence on Sept. 23, when the campaign suspended Michael Doyne, a 28-year-old staff member in Nashville, for boasting - and later denying - that there was a ''mole'' inside the Bush campaign.
Despite the embarrassment, Fabiani said that an internal review found there was ''no evidence whatsoever that the campaign has either received or used confidential information from the Bush campaign.''
The Gore camp privately offered a few of its own theories about what had happened. One was that it was being set up by Rove, Bush's chief political strategist. Another was that it was being the unwitting beneficiary of McKinnon, a onetime Democrat who was now on Bush's payroll.
The speculation about McKinnon centers on several facts: He is a former Democratic strategist, he had a copy of the debate tape, and perhaps most significantly, a security camera in an Austin post office taped one of his aides, Yvette Lozano, mailing a package on Sept. 11. That is the same day the package was sent to Downey.
In an interview with ABC News, both McKinnon and Lozano denied any wrongdoing. Lozano, 30, said the package she was seen mailing contained not a videotape, but a pair of $19.99 khaki pants that McKinnon asked her to mail back to The Gap because they were the wrong shade. McKinnon produced for reporters an unopened package from The Gap, which he said contained the pants the company had mailed in return.
The Washington Post reported that law enforcement officials are focused on Lozano.
She had told ABC that the FBI twice fingerprinted her and seized her computer. Two agents also gave her a warning, Lozano said: ''Their words were, `We guarantee you will not be arrested if you tell us right now who put you up to this.'''
Lozano stuck by her story, telling the network, ''I offered to take the lie-detector test. I've offered my fingerprints on numerous occasions. I've given them multiple samples of my fingerprints. And the truth is on my side.''
The FBI remains mum about its investigation, which it terms a ''preliminary inquiry.'' A spokeswoman said it is unclear whether any federal laws were broken.
