EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Piers de Laszlo’s battle with cancer forces him to abandon his dream of a haven for fellow artists in Portugal

His mother envisaged years of bliss married to her war-hero husband, Group Captain Peter Townsend, only for the dream to fall foul of Townsend’s duties as equerry to George VI – and the proximity of the Monarch’s vivacious younger daughter, Princess Margaret.

Now Piers de Laszlo – Rosemary Townsend’s only son by her second marriage – is coming to terms with a heartbreaking loss of his own following a debilitating battle with cancer.

To his intense regret, it’s forced him to abandon his…