Tiny, shy and rather ineffectual, his father arranged his marriage to Maria Christina de Borbon y Bosch La Brus, a sixteen-year-old relative of King Alfonso XIII of Spain. In due course his
strong-willed wife became Duchess of Durcal and hated him. Nevertheless they became the parents of two daughters.
In the spring of 1940 his wife hit the headlines when she was voted by the fashion designers of Paris as the world's best dressed woman, the Duchess of Windsor coming second. Antenor pretended to be pleased but resented her extravagance. In 1944 she left him to go to America, arranging an immediate settlement of half a million dollars, confirmed by a New York court, with another half million to be paid by 1951, or before then if Senor Patino should be unfaithful. In 1945
Antenor started legal proceedings to cancel the agreement and arrange a divorce. For more than twenty years the actions would rage through the courts of France, the United States, Bolivia, Spain and Mexico when Antenor moved there.
The Duchess of Durcal even arranged to have him arrested when he arrived in New York, alleging that he was late with his maintenance payments. He was taken from his plane at Idlewild to spend a night in jail. Since 1947 Antenor had sought solace with the Countess di Rovasenda, whom he would later marry when he thought he was legally divorced, only to find himself involved with another battery of legal actions from the Duchess, who slapped a writ on him, charging him 'with living in a state of concubinage in the marital home'. She insisted that divorce was impossible because she was Catholic, and would only become possible if she was given half his fortune.

In 1947 Antenor had inherited a reputed $200 million from his father and, in 1952, a left-wing government took power in Bolivia, seizing what remaining assets he had there. However, the family
fortune had been based overseas for several decades and Antenor lived in a huge house on the Avenue Foch, one of half a dozen he owned.
Also in 1952, Antenor and the Duchess suspended hostilities in the courts for a more pressing activity: they had to find husbands for their two daughters, Christina and Isabel. The two girls were rich, heirs to the Patino fortune, had royal blood and were more than pretty. Christina had ideas of her own; she fell in love with an American and, when Antenor refused permission to marry, ran off with him to Madrid. But wealth had great power and Antenor managed to have her brought back to Paris.
Prince Marc de Beauvau-Craon, known to Antenor from before the Second World War, was aristocratic but also impoverished. He was a director of a small travel agency in Paris and manager of another firm, but he earned nowhere near enough for the upkeep of his estate, the Chateau d'Harou‚ near Nancy, which was in much need of repair.Marc proposed to marry Isabel but Antenor disapproved, not because of his financial status but because of Isabel's age. Prince Marc then shifted his attention to Christina and, at the end of 1952, they were married in a ceremony to which half of the royal families of Europe were invited.
For Isabel's eighteenth birthday Antenor arranged to give her a large party in London. The night of the coronation also happened to be the eve of Isabel's eighteenth birthday, and her father had organised her party at Claridges. After the dinner there, Isabel joined some friends at a party at Al Burnett's Stork Room and here she met James Goldsmith.
After the birthday night, James went back to Paris while Isabel followed and soon they began to see more and more of each other. Antenor Patino, a watchful parent, learned soon enough whom she was seeing and, disapproving of James Goldsmith, asked him to come to his office. However, the confrontation did not go as planned. If Antenor expected someone overawed and nervous, he was unnerved by the tall, confident young man who now appeared before him in his study.
Apparently, after Antenor Patino became very angry, the following conversation took place:
 "Young man," Antenor shouted, "we come from an old Catholic family."
"Perfect," replied Goldsmith, "I come from an old Jewish family."
"It is not the habit of members of our family to marry Jews."
"It is not our habit to marry Red Indians," Goldsmith is said to have replied. 
He was referring to Antenor's father, a half-blood Indian from Columbia. However, Patino would not relent and threatened his daughter with placing her in a convent.
Meanwhile, the courtship between James Goldsmith and Isabel continued in secret and, in November 1953, Isabel realised she was pregnant. Not aware that she was pregnant but knowing she was still seeing James Goldsmith, Antenor Patino despatched Isabel on a world tour and sent lawyers to Goldsmith, threatening to have him locked up.
After two days Goldsmith learned that Isabel was in Casablanca and hired a plane to follow her. However, Patino found out and ordered Isabel to return to Paris. As their planes crossed on Le Bourget, James Goldsmith had gone to North Africa for nothing. However, a friend was asked by Goldsmith to intervene, posing as a driving instructor for Isabel and requiring Isabel's passport, maintaining that she needed extra visas, and with no problems Isabel was on a plane to London.

From Casablanca James flew to London and both went to Scotland to be followed by Antenor Patino, who then was joined by his Duchess. However, after several legal manoeuvres, Antenor had to admit defeat and secretly left for London. Only then did the Duchess learn that her
daughter was pregnant and, as a result, on 7 January 1954, Isabel and James married. When it was reported in the press that the marriage had taken place, Antenor was reported to have remarked,  "Everything seems to have ended happily."
However, it is doubted that Antenor Patino had made that remark and events that followed were far from happy. His daughter and her new husband returned to Paris. In May 1954 everything changed. Isabel suffered a massive cerebral haemorrhage and was taken to hospital. The only hope given was a difficult operation to relieve the pressure on the brain and the same evening the operation took place. These events reconciled the Duchess with James Goldsmith. However, after the operation Isabel remained in a coma and soon the docters warned that they could expect the worst. On 14 May, by Caesarean operation, the two month premature baby was delivered and that evening Isabel was again unsuccessfully operated on. After receiving the last rites, she died a few hours later. Isabel and James Goldsmith had known each other for just eleven months. Years later James Goldsmith rang a friend who had just lost his wife, he was asked, "How long does it
take to get over it?" to this Goldsmith replied "I don'think you ever do."

The Duchess of Durcal inveigled herself into James's good books and basically kidnapped the baby. However, after an extraordinary court case she was forced to return the baby. James Goldsmith then showed tolerance towards Antenor Patino and his wife for the rest of their lives, ignoring the injuries they had caused him. Many years later, when both their financial circumstances were very different, Antenor Patino went to him for help and James acted as if he were part of his family.
Condensed from "Billionaire" by Ivan Fallon.

Source: Leo van de Pas