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By Lloyd Grove
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 30, 2001; Page C03

Presidential niece Lauren Bush, draped in an American flag quilt, graces the June cover of Tatler magazine's "special U.S. edition," which calls the 16-year-old 11th-grader a "New American Icon."

A model niece: The June cover of Tatler magazine's "special U.S. edition" features Lauren Bush draped in the American flag. (By Gary Conover )

"It's very flattering that they would choose me," the part-time model told us yesterday when we reached her in Houston, where she had just taken her Spanish final and was studying for her math exam. "It was a lot of fun and I had a good time during the photo shoot."

Lauren, eldest daughter of Uncle George W. Bush's younger brother Neil and Neil's wife, Sharon, gets a glammed-up eight-page spread in the British magazine, with photos by Hugh Stewart (including a fetching pose in cowgirl garb at a diner in New Jersey), all under the headline "BUSH BABE." In the accompanying article, she and her mom talk about her two-year modeling career, her friends at school, the president and her poetry -- but not her supposed romance with Prince William that was so breathlessly chronicled in the British tabloids. That subject she saved for us.

"That story just got blown out of proportion," she said. "The British press just loves to make this stuff up. This, hopefully, is dying out. There's nothing really to it." She added: "I've not met him." And what about those steamy e-mails she and Wills are supposed to have exchanged? True? "No," she giggled. "People just wanna, like, believe this stuff. It's just funny."

Of Tatler's U.S. cover, Bush said: "I think we shot it in maybe December or January, and it was really cold outside. Other than that it was fun. I think the classic American style is what they were going for."

Lauren, who'll be the guest of honor at a Tatler party in New York next Monday, told us she donates a portion of her earnings to local Texas charities, notably animal shelters. "I've been a vegetarian since I was 4, so I felt pretty strongly about animals and felt that I might as well give back," she said.

Asked if her uncle's move to the White House has given her a career boost, Lauren said: "Actually, at the same time he was starting his campaign, I was asked to be in a debutante ball, le Crillon, which is a big deal all over Europe. But it takes a while to build a portfolio and all that. I'm sure it might have helped a bit. But it's not like I'm riding on the coattails. Modeling and politics are pretty separate."

Clearly, Lauren needs to spend more time in Washington.

・The soap opera of the many loves of Archbishop George A. Stallings Jr. continued apace yesterday when Washington PR executive Linda Greene -- whom the 53-year-old Stallings dumped to marry a 24-year-old Japanese woman handpicked by Unification Church leader Sun Myung Moon -- went on the radio to reveal details of their breakup.

The Post's Hamil R. Harris reports that WOL-AM host Joe Madison asked the 49 year-old Greene to describe her relationship with the defrocked Catholic priest, who on Sunday said his vows to Moon disciple Sayomi Kamimoto in a mass wedding in New York. "He was my companion for 10 years," Greene replied. "My partner. My best friend. He was my all-in-all. But this is not a George-and-Linda issue." She added that Stallings broke the bad news to her over dinner May 5. "At the end of the meal he said, 'I am getting married.' I was shocked," she said. Madison asked, "Was there any indication that another woman was in his life?" Greene answered, "None -- and I would know."

She said she and Stallings normally talked between six and 12 times a day, but their phone calls fell off when he started working in the New York headquarters of the Rev. Moon's church several months ago. "He was spending days and weekends in the corporate headquarters of the Unification Church," Greene said.

・We wondered if runner-turned-congressman Jim Ryun is depressed now that Reston teenager Alan Webb, of South Lakes High School, has shattered Ryun's 36-year-old record for a mile run by a high schooler. "Absolutely not. I'm thrilled for Alan," the Kansas Republican told us yesterday, two days after Webb ran the mile in 3:53.43 -- nearly two seconds ahead of Ryun's 1965 showing of 3:55.3. "I'm just surprised my record lasted so long."

・News you can lose: Never mind reports in the New York Post; U.S. News & World Report editor Steve Smith tells us he's not a candidate to take over Smithsonian magazine. "I've not been offered the job and I'm not going to be the editor of Smithsonian," Smith told us yesterday.

・So we have to find out from the New York Times? We belatedly report that our Post colleague Rachel Alexander, who writes about sports, has married into showbiz. On Friday in Venice, the daughter of Potomac residents Jane and Ronald Jacobs tied the knot with record producer Max Nichols, son of writer-director Mike Nichols and novelist Annabel Davis-Goff, and stepson of television diva Diane Sawyer.