In 1931 he became Mussolini's ambassador to London, and there he had affairs with some of the most influential noblewomen of the time—including Lady Alexandra Curzon, daughter of the Viceroy of India, George Curzon.
Before World War II she earned the sobriquet Baba Blackshirt, and for a while played a murky role as a semiwitting go-between for Oswald Mosley and her other lover at the time, Dino Grandi, Benito Mussolini's ambassador to London, while simultaneously enjoying the romantic devotion of the foreign secretary, Lord Halifax, who was staying at the same Dorchester Hotel as Alexandra and her sister.
He remained in England until 1939.