Motive behind party questioned

 BY FRANCES ROBLES

 WASHINGTON -- For the first time since flying to the nation's capital aboard a
 U.S. Marshals Service plane two weeks ago, Elian Gonzalez appeared in public
 over the weekend -- at the home of a Washington, D.C., power broker who
 opposes the Cuba trade embargo.

 The boy's presence Saturday at the tony Georgetown home of Smith Bagley,
 grandson of tobacco magnate R.J. Reynolds and a big-time Democratic donor
 and fund-raiser, inspired criticism in Miami.

 ``What's he doing there?'' Spencer Eig, attorney for Elian's Miami relatives, said
 Monday. ``It doesn't look right.''

 But a source close to the Cuban Interests Section said the idea behind the party
 was innocent enough -- to get the Gonzalezes out of the Wye Plantation, a rural
 estate where they have lived in seclusion with Cuban visitors for two weeks.

 ``It had to do with going out of their way to show he's not a hostage,'' said the
 source, who asked not to be identified.

 The choice to hold the outing at the Bagleys made sense, the source said.
 Bagley is a wheeler dealer married to the former U.S. ambassador to Portugal.
 Elian was hardly his first famed guest: He's hosted Bill and Hillary Clinton, Barbra
 Streisand and Gen. Colin Powell.

 Bagley offered $10,000 to Bill Clinton's legal defense fund and is the money
 behind the Arca Foundation, an organization devoted to more contact and fewer
 trade restrictions with Cuba. As chairman, Bagley heads what is much like the
 Cuban American National Foundation of the other side of the Cuba debate.

 Arca's $72 million has offered millions to organizations that sponsor things like
 university study in Cuba and marine projects. In 1998, it gave $75,000 to the
 Miami-based Cuban Committee for Democracy, whose chairwoman is Elena
 Freyre. The group actively argues for a less hardline U.S. posture toward Cuba.

 Bagley is a former national finance chairman of the Democratic Party.

 ``Smith Bagley is financier of not the anti-embargo movement, but the pro-Castro
 movement,' said Jose Cardenas, director of the Cuban American National
 Foundation's Washington office. ``He's openly hard-core, low-key but very
 committed. He and his wife are the prototypical power couple -- wanting to
 impress their similarly minded friends with, `We are so tied in that we can serve
 up to you Juan Miguel and the little raft boy.' It bugs me.''

 Sean Garcia, executive director of the Washington office of the Cuban Committee
 for Democracy, said Bagley is known as a man who puts his money behind his
 philosophies. ``This is a person genuinely interested in the future of Cuba and
 Cuban people.''

 Garcia said the excursion was a positive sign that the family was not just
 reacquainting themselves to each other, but to society.

 Reached at home Sunday night, Bagley declined to comment. ``I'm not going to
 get in to this,'' Bagley said ``Not now.''

 Monday, a secretary said he and Arca director Donna Edwards were out of the
 office and unavailable.

 Gregory Craig, the attorney for Elian's father, did not return calls. Neither did
 officials from the Cuban Interests Section.

 The outing prompted more discussion about how Elian is coping with his
 transition to Washington and the reunion with his father.

 Elian has been kept out of sight at the Wye Plantation, where he is said to be
 attending classes and playing with his visiting Cuban schoolmates.

 One new fact: He was taught last week to ride a bicycle by a U.S. marshal
 assigned to protect the family.

 There was little information about how Elian enjoyed himself at the party, except a
 photo of him leaving the Bagley home that showed him looking downward with his
 hands tucked in his pockets. In Havana, the Cuban Communist Party daily
 Granma on Monday made a one-paragraph reference to the outing buried in a
 lengthy report about public demonstrations in South Florida over the weekend.
 The article said Elian ``shared some pleasant moments with [Smith Bagley's]
 son, a boy his age.''

 ``I hope someone finds out what condition Elian is in, because he didn't look
 happy,'' said Armando Gutierrez, the spokesman for the Miami relatives.

 Among the guests at the gathering were Elian's father, stepmother and baby
 half-brother and Cuba's top diplomat in Washington, Fernando Remirez, who
 brought his wife, Patricia, and two children.

 Cuba watchers said the visit should not come as a shock.

 ``It's no surprise that the conservative sector finds it distasteful,'' said Gillian Gunn
 Clissold, director of the Caribbean Project at Georgetown University. ``What are
 they supposed to do, stay in their house and not talk to anyone?''

 Herald staff writers Ana Acle and Jay Weaver contributed to this report, as did
 Herald research editor Elisabeth Donovan.