He should be respectful. He should say: This has been a historic exercise in democracy, a profound expression of the popular will, and similar sentiments. He should neither reject nor accept the result. He should simply say: A majority of voters have answered Yes to the question put by the Parti Quebecois government. It is important that we all take some time to consider carefully what this means. The people of Quebec have spoken. Now let's figure out what they've said.

The first thing he should do, in other words, is nothing. He should not resign. He should not call an election. He should not offer to negotiate separation, or anything else. Under no circumstances should he meet with the premiers, whose only thought would be to use the opportunity to challenge federal authority. He should govern for all Canadians, and let any who dare to be disloyal risk the people's wrath. His only mandate is to keep the country whole, and it is our duty as Canadians to rally round him in this cause.

A Yes vote, if it comes, would not represent the spontaneous uprising of a people seizing its destiny, and everyone in Quebec knows it. It is, rather, a precisely manufactured coalition of the confused, assembled by a campaign of breathtaking dishonesty around an almost scientifically duplicitous question. But the very cunning of this approach would leave the separatists with a severely weakened mandate. These are not the votes of people willing to pay any price or bear any burden in the name of a separate Quebec. They are people who were told it wouldn't cost a thing - indeed that it wouldn't change a thing, except to remodel Confederation to Quebec's designs.

This sort of slippery soft-soapery may prove sufficient - it was certainly necessary - to haul support for the Yes above 50 per cent on voting day. But to reach their goal of independence, the separatists would have to hold onto this shaky coalition through a series of perilous adventures. The referendum, in other words, would have just begun.

Mr. Bouchard expects all Quebeckers will unite in support of sovereignty after a Yes. Barring a catastrophically inept response by the federal government - arresting Mr. Bouchard, say - this seems unlikely. Apart from his federalist convictions, there would be little incentive for Liberal Leader Daniel Johnson, in particular, to cross over: The 49 per cent who voted No provide a solid base of support on which to fight the next election. The cracks in the sovereignty coalition, meanwhile, would be exposed by detailed polls in the days after the referendum, asking voters probing questions on why they voted as they did.

All the same, some delicacy would be required, so as not to provoke the surge in solidarity Mr. Bouchard needs. The Prime Minister should be content to sit tight, and let the separatists make the first move. With a modicum of political art, federalists might hope over time to split off bits of the sovereignty coalition. The separatists might then be tempted to overstep their mandate, or fall out amongst themselves.

This will not happen overnight. Each side will try to portray the other as dilatory and intransigent, in hopes of swinging the public mood their way. But time is against the separatists, as the province's fiscal pressures mount. At some point, the PQ government will have to raise taxes or cut spending, or be cut off by international lenders. Anger at the government might well translate into a dip in support for sovereignty, as might the disillusionment of those who believed Mr. Bouchard's promises that the negotiations on a new partnership would all be wrapped up within days.

Suppose, a month or two after the referendum, the polls show support for sovereignty has slipped to 40 per cent. At this point, one of two things might happen. Either the federal government might put a counter- referendum to Quebeckers. Or the separatists may decide to pull the pin on a unilateral declaration of independence. Indeed, this is the only circumstance in which it is conceivable they would take such an enormous gamble. It would be one thing if they could claim 80-per-cent support for independence. But 51 per cent? The most militant union leader in the world would not take his members out on such a mandate. It would tear the union apart. As it might Quebec.

So a UDI is most likely to be a desperation move, taken from a position of weakness, not of strength. Could the separatists carry the mortgage- holders of Outremont with them for such a leap into the legal void? Or would this mark, more even than a No vote, the final discrediting of the separatist option?