After Ben Goldsmith and Kate Rothschild's acrimonious split, will the second Goldsmith-Rothschild marriage last longer than the first?
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Of all the legacies left to his children by the late Jimmy Goldsmith, none is more memorable than his oft-repeated aphorism on fidelity. ‘When a man marries his mistress, he creates a vacancy,’ opined the late Sir James, whose libidinous actions were as good as his word.
So heaven knows what Alice Rothschild’s family were thinking when Zac Goldsmith recently got down on one knee to her.
The occasion was a dinner in London to mark Alice’s birthday, attended by close friends and family, all of whom, I am told, were ‘delighted and thrilled’ for the couple. Which, if true, is quite an achievement given the fraught manner in which they came together.
Just a few months ago, Zac Goldsmith was stating he had 'no plans' to marry Alice Rothschild, who at 28 is almost a decade his junior
For Alice was Zac’s mistress — the ‘other woman’ whose secret liaisons led to the collapse of his marriage to the beautiful Sheherazade, a union which had lasted ten years and produced three children.
In the minds of many of their friends, the ink is barely dry on the decree absolute.
Even last week, after a newspaper reported the happy news of his engagement to Alice, 37-year-old Zac was less than enthusiastic, lambasting the newspaper on Twitter for being ‘low grade and unreliable’. This comment could easily be construed as — deliberately or otherwise — implying the story was untrue.
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ShareThis is not the case. Zac and Alice are engaged and there were 40 witnesses to the event.
If not a bolt from the blue, the proposal has certainly ruffled feathers in society circles, with much chattering about the reasons behind it.
For just a matter of months ago, Zac was stating he had ‘no plans’ to marry Alice, who at 28 is almost a decade his junior.
And having sold off his much-loved Devon estate in the process of divorcing Sheherazade, few would blame him for wanting to enjoy the simple life of bachelorhood for a while longer.
‘That’s no longer the case,’ a friend told me this week. ‘Zac and Alice are as solid as a rock and this is the real thing.
Alice was Zac's mistress - the 'other woman' whose secret liaisons led to the collapse of his marriage to the beautiful Sheherazade, pictured here with Zac in 1999
The plan is for them to get married next year. I think what annoyed Zac was the notion this was some sort of secret engagement. It could hardly have been more public, without doing it in Trafalgar Square, though he was concerned to be respectful to Sheherazade.
‘This has been a difficult year for the two families and to have a bit of good news like this is a godsend. They’re all hoping it will be a healing process.’
This last remark is a cryptic reference to the recent split between Zac’s younger brother, Ben, and Alice’s older sister, Kate.
Their nine-year marriage collapsed earlier this year amid allegations Kate had embarked on an affair with the American rapper Jay Electronica, prompting Ben to unleash a bitter war of words on Twitter.
Such was the rancour between them that Ben was arrested after slapping his wife during an argument. Though no charges ensued, the two families seemed set to go to war. The fact they did not — and that a second marriage between them is imminent — speaks volumes about the extraordinary bond between two wealthy dynasties.
Ben Goldsmith was just 22 when he married Kate, scion of the Rothschild and Guinness dynasties. Both the Goldsmith brothers had three children before they or their wives turned 30
Not that they are keen to talk about it. Zac is famously wary of the media, except when holding forth about his environmental passions, and his Twitter-enthusiast siblings have been silent on the matter this week.
His mother, Lady Annabel, meanwhile, speaking from her home on the fringes of Ham Common in West London, was her usual charming self, telling me: ‘I’m terribly sorry about this but I simply cannot talk about anything to do with the family. It’s a rule we stick by.’
Given the messy origins of the scenario, one can hardly blame her. When Zac first started seeing Alice, she was no more than his brother’s sister-in-law, while he was married to Sheherazade.
Zac followed the family tradition of marrying young. He was 21 when he met Sheherazade — the stunning daughter of Seventies asset stripper John Bentley and Colombian actress Viviane Ventura — and 24 when they wed. Four years later, 22-year-old Ben married Kate, scion of the Rothschild and Guinness dynasties.
The boys' mother, Lady Annabel, was unwilling to discuss anything to do with her family: 'It's a rule we stick by'
Both the Goldsmith brothers had three children before they or their wives turned 30.
It was a burden of responsibility to place on such young shoulders, particularly given the marital record set by their father, and some would say it was only a matter of time until the dam burst.
It is understood Zac initiated an affair with Alice in 2008.
At first, he dismissed gossip they were lovers by insisting his regular afternoon visits to her flat were ‘planning meetings’ for a charity poker night they were organising.
Nobody was fooled and he resisted the entreaties of Sheherazade to give up his mistress. She was shattered by this and despite doing her best to deal with the situation (she had previously declared herself ‘a realist’ about the magnetism exerted by her husband), it was to no avail.
Sheherazade filed for divorce, citing Zac’s adultery, prompting him to hire Prince Charles’s lawyer Fiona Shackleton to negotiate a settlement.
Zac quit the marital home — a £7.5million gated mansion near Richmond Golf Club — setting up with Alice in a modest cottage in the grounds of his mother’s Queen Anne home.
Friends questioned why he would throw away a decade of marriage to one of the most desired women in London for a far less celebrated beauty. This, however, is to underestimate that extraordinary mutual attraction between the two dynasties.
The Rothschild and Goldsmith families are blood relations who can trace their heritage to the Jewish ghettos of 18th-century Frankfurt. And while they have been rivals throughout that time, the shared history counts for a great deal.
Just as important is Zac’s sense that few people can truly understand the pressures of being born into immense wealth. He has ploughed his energy into environmentalism and politics, but away from work, friends say he can struggle to ‘fit in’ in social situations.
And while Sheherazade brought little fortune to their marriage, the same could not be said of Alice. Zac’s money is tied up in family trusts which are so convoluted his father boasted they could never be unravelled. When Sir James died, he left assets worth around £1.2billion and each of his offspring was estimated to have received £10million in spending money.
Zac is said to be worth £300million, and while his divorce has made a £20million dent in that, he is hardly heading for bankruptcy.
Alice shared an £18million inheritance when her father, Amschel, committed suicide in a Paris hotel room in 1996 aged 41.
Ben Goldsmith and Kate Rotschild's nine-year marriage collapsed amid allegations Kate and American rapper Jay Electronica, pictured, had embarked on an affair
The half brother of Jacob, Lord Rothschild, Amschel was being groomed to take over the family bank from his second cousin, Sir Evelyn de Rothschild. He was found hanged when Alice was just 12.
It certainly puts her burning desire for stability into context. She is a loyal friend to those who are allowed to become close. Friends say she looked up to him as a role model before they became an item. They have gone to great lengths to conduct their relationship discreetly, with consideration for Sheherazade and the children a high priority.
The engagement is said to have been accelerated by a thawing in relations between Zac and his now ex-wife. Sheherazade has moved on and since the beginning of last year has been in a relationship with the Mexican-born film director Alfonso Cuaron.
The pair went public by attending the Baftas together and, since then, relations with Zac have improved — she and her new boyfriend enjoyed a holiday together at the Goldsmith family’s luxurious home in Mexico.
Zac was 21 when he met Sheherazade, the stunning daughter of Seventies asset stripper John Bentley and Colombian actress Viviane Ventura
A case of happily ever after? Not so fast, say the society gossips. When it comes to these families, history is always snapping at the heels.
Like his forebears before him, Sir James was an inveterate philanderer, conducting concurrent liaisons with his second wife Ginette, the woman who was to become his next wife, Lady Annabel, and several mistresses.
Those mistresses included Zac’s first cousin, Lady Cosima Somerset (who was brought up as the daughter of Lady Annabel’s brother, the Marquess of Londonderry, only to learn many years later that she was fathered by pianist Robin Douglas-Home).
Zac is very much his father’s son, possessed of a disarming charm and an unmistakable allure, borne of money and power. As one young society woman puts it: ‘He’s not your typical ladies’ man — he’s too tall and gangly for that. But there’s a languid charm about him — a quiet confidence which probably comes from being enormously wealthy.
Somehow, it makes him strangely irresistible, despite a rather limp handshake.’
Though it has done no harm to his political career, such charisma is not always a force for good. Within weeks of the scandal about his affair with Alice breaking, Zac was subjected to a three-month stalking campaign by an unbalanced married woman who became obsessed with him.
Why, then, does Alice Rothschild wish to marry a man carrying such baggage? The more waspish gossips are speculating on whether she might be pregnant, prompting a shotgun marriage. That there is no substance to the allegation deters them not a jot.
Others of a more sympathetic bent point to a more simple answer — one far older than the historic dynasties which have spawned this union. Love.
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