Updated: Mar 16 1998 10:01AM

WASHINGTON: It began barely hours after Kathleen Willey came out in the most public forum possible -- a "60 Minutes" interview -- to claim the President had kissed, groped and fondled her, contrary to his sworn statement in the Paula Jones case. It was a stampede to judgment of the kind not seen since the Lewinsky crisis began, and its tracks were marked by those two well-worn words: If true. "If the evidence is true... I think this presidency will be over," said Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). "If it's true, it's sexual assault," said Patricia Ireland, president of NOW.

If it's true, undoubtedly, Clinton is in trouble. He will have committed perjury, and Ken Starr's investigation -- long mired in arguments over immunity and executive privilege -- will have something to nail him on. But where Willey is concerned, questions persist: Why did Linda Tripp describe her as "joyous" after her Oval Office encounter? Why did Willey continue to write Clinton and his personal assistant, Nancy Hernreich, in what sources describe as a "consistently friendly and admiring manner" after he had supposedly assaulted her? Why does her Jones testimony contradict another sworn deposition, in a lawsuit against her late husband -- in which Willey claims she told no one, the President included, of the financial trouble her family was in?

There are questions from the other side, too. Why, as Newsweek reports this week, did Democratic fundraiser Nathan Landow fly Willey in to his estate for a two-day visit after she was subpoened by Paula Jones' lawyers? Landow says he did not try to influence her testimony. And speaking of testimony, there appears to be a conflict between Clinton's in the Jones lawsuit, when he said Betty Curry talked with his friend Vernon Jordan about attempts to find Monica Lewinsky a job, and Jordan's firm declaration that he himself kept Clinton informed. It was a weekend when the temperature of the case rose, and new conflicts emerged, and in none of the developments did there appear to be good news for Bill Clinton.

-- Chris Taylor