Andy J. Bleiler, right, outside his Portland, Ore., home. (AP)

Page Two

As for Lewinsky herself, much remains uncertain about the veracity of her information. She left for her father's home in Los Angeles last Tuesday and has rarely emerged.

In a written "proffer" given to Starr on Monday, her lawyer listed what Lewinsky could be expected to say if she eventually testified under immunity. She asserts in that statement that she did have a sexual relationship with the president, according to sources familiar with the document.

She told something similar to at least one of her friends. Eleven days ago, Andy J. Bleiler, Lewinsky's former high school drama instructor, said he had a five-year affair with Lewinsky that ended last spring. In conversations with Lewinsky, Bleiler recalled, Lewinsky would boast that she was involved in a sexual relationship with a "high-ranking White House official."

She did not name the official, Bleiler said through his lawyer, although she called him "the creep," the same term she later had used in referring to Clinton during her taped conversations with Tripp.

Bleiler's role in understanding Lewinsky's credibility is intricate. On the surface, his account appears to corroborate the notion that there was an affair with Clinton. Yet he said through his lawyer that he and his wife, whom Lewinsky also befriended, often did not believe Lewinsky, saying she had a "pattern of twisting facts."

A Frequent Visitor

The New York Times, The Washington Post and other major news organizations reported last week that the logs show that Lewinsky was cleared to enter the White House about three dozen times between April 1996 -- when she left her job there for a new position at the Pentagon -- and the beginning of this year.

Although the White House has refused to make the contents of the logs public, previous reporting using unnamed sources has established that the logs show that up to a dozen of those visits occurred during the second half of 1997, and half of those visits occurring in the period from late October through the end of December.

This was at a time when Lewinsky was both seeking employment outside of government and, in the latter stages at least, concerned that she was being drawn into the Jones lawsuit.

In most cases, Lewinsky was cleared to enter the White House by Currie.

Other reporting has established that Clinton and Lewinsky met at the White House on Dec. 28, the Sunday after Christmas. Whether they met alone or were joined by someone else has not been established in the public record.

Overall, the logs suggest a frequency of visits unusual for any former White House employee.

Appearing on CNBC's "Rivera Live" on Wednesday, former White House press secretary Dee Dee Myers said: "There's no way to convince the American public that 37 visits to the White House by a former intern is routine. That's extraordinary. It's out of the ordinary. And that raises a lot of questions. . . . I haven't visited the White House 37 times since I left. George Stephanopoulos hasn't visited the White House 37 times since he left a year ago."

But there are limitations on what the logs can prove. For one thing, they are not a fully reliable accounting of the times Lewinsky entered and left the White House. She could have been cleared for entry without ever having actually gone in. She may have entered, but visited someone other than the president. And even if she visited the president, the logs offer no evidence of any sexual relationship.

Almost from the day the Lewinsky story broke, there have been reports that someone -- a Secret Service agent, a White House official, a low-level assistant, a steward -- may have seen the president and Lewinsky alone together in a compromising position.