"There was a Master come unto the earth, born in the holy land of Indiana, raised in the mystical hills east of Fort Wayne." So begins Illusions, the Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah (Delacorte Press; $5.95), by the man who gave the world Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Richard Bach's latest whimsy is about an automobile mechanic named Donald Shimoda who barnstorms around the Midwest and preaches homilies. An old barnstormer himself, Bach used to dream of meeting just such a man to answer his questions like: "Why are we living?" Responding to his own questions, he has his character Shimoda explain that we are all "game-playing, fun-having creatures, we are the otters of the universe." Meanwhile, the fun-having author has bought himself an old U.S. Air Force T-33 jet trainer to whisk back and forth between his Winter Haven, Fla., home and Hollywood, to film his Illusions.

That young lady caught with her pants down is Australian-born Actress Belinda Bauer in the movie made from Richard Condon's Winter Kills. When a wealthy heir (Jeff Bridges) takes her out to lunch, the stuffy maitre d' tries to kick her out for wearing a pantsuit. Belinda blithely drops her trousers and sits down anyway. "It was a wonderful moment," recalls the sometime model, "but then I'm an exhibitionist." She is also a perfectionist: for her first film role--Belinda, 26, plays a reporter for a national newsmagazine--she spent days observing journalists. "I learned that women reporters are everything from sweet little old ladies to dynamic young women," she says. "Whatever they are, they always have to think fast." .

"When I acted in France, I played romantic roles and comedy. But here in the U.S., I am the mean lady," says Swiss-born Actress Marthe Keller, 30. Mean is perhaps not quite the word for her roles as a double agent in Marathon Man and as a Palestinian terrorist in Black Sunday. "I couldn't connect with that part, it was so violent," she says. "I played it cold, without emotion, like I would do Lady Macbeth." Her next appearance will be in Bobby Deerfield with her real-life love Al Pacino. She is also signed to play in Director Billy Wilder's movie of Thomas Tryon's bestseller Crowned Heads. Her role: Fedora, a mysterious Hollywood actress who has in her something of Garbo, Dietrich and Gloria Swanson. .

"Taxation without representation!" Once again that shrill cry was heard from rebellious New Englanders as some of the residents of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard voted last week to secede from Massachusetts--and sported secession bumper stickers. They were protesting a redistricting plan under which Martha's Vineyard would lose the seat that it has had in the state legislature for 285 years (TIME, March 21). In the unlikely event the islands cast themselves off, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and Rhode Island have offered to take them under their banner. Meanwhile, some of the summer crowd are lobbying for total independence. Says Opera Singer Beverly Sills: "If we do secede, I'm putting in my bid for Minister of Culture." Columnist Art Buchwald, another summer resident, says that as the new nation of Martha's Tucket, "We could get foreign aid." What to do with it? Answers Art:

"We'll split it up, of course, and deposit it in numbered Swiss bank accounts."

Bells of all sorts will soon be ringing for Muhammad AH. Wedding chimes for Mr. I-Am-The-Greatest and ex-Beauty Queen Veronica Porche, 21, will sound in Los Angeles "some time in June, maybe the 10th," announced Ali last week. But the twice-wed champ seemed more concerned with bells in the ring. On May 16 he will defend his heavyweight title at Capital Centre in Landover, Md., against Spain's Alfredo Evangelista. "I think I'll get into the ring and knock him down, but I just don't know," he said with uncharacteristic modesty. "He's 22 and I'm 35 and he's killed hisself training. It's exactly like Rocky. "Or so he hopes. . The young lady from Ketchum, Idaho, is dusting off some old tricks. Margaux Hemingway, 22, is still busy earning her million dollars posing in the snow for Faberge's new Babe commercials. But what she really wants to do is sing and act. At a taping of the Mike Douglas Show last week, to be aired April 28, she crooned an old "swing song" she used to sing in the cowboy bars back home. "Singing is a real upper. It makes me feel dizzy and energetic," says Margaux. As for acting, she is undeterred by the unpromising reviews she got in the film Lipstick and is hoping to do a western. "I have an affinity for that sort of era," says Ernest Hemingway's granddaughter. "I'd like to play a cowboy, I mean cowgirl. Um, cowperson?" .

When in Rome..., but when in San Francisco, improvise. At least that was what Italian Director Lina Wertmuller did on the set of A Night Full of Rain. While shooting a scene with Actor Gianearlo Giannini atop a 52-story skyscraper, Lina decided that the Bank of America building simply wasn't high enough. "I had to stand on top of an 18-ft. tower she had built on top of it," complains Giancarlo, who starred in Seven Beauties, Swept Away and three other Wertmuller movies. "That's typical of Lina, to alter everything she finds, even a skyscraper." When it came to filming scenes with Co-Star Candice Bergen, the perfectionist director was equally demanding. Says Giannini: "We must have embraced each other 600 times." . Most dancers do their plies at the bar, but one of the New York City Ballet's principal dancers also practices hers in the pool. In the Water Beauty Book (St. Martin's Press; $10), Allegro Kent, 39, demonstrates how she keeps in shape with aquatic acrobatics, using plastic water wings. "I try to undulate like a sea anemone with them," she says. "When I wear them, I feel that I'm in a different world. It's kind of like floating around in outer space, only wetter."

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