as the handsome ones who had nothing more than charming manners to their names. The Marquis d’Auvernay, as she’d said to Lazare, was wealthy in every way, for he had youth, money, looks, and intelligence. But he hadn’t yet asked for Sophie’s hand.
“No one’s proposed, if that’s what you mean.”
Rosier’s eyes lit. “Just what I wished to know! Bien sûr, I know I am a long shot. But as long as there’s a chance, I will keep trying.”
Camille hoped he would. After her visit with Rosier yesterday, Sophie seemed happier than she had in a long time. “Bonne chance, dear Rosier. I will be cheering you on.”
* * *
Once she’d left most of the pamphlets with Lasalle—who had bowed to her, who had no pamphlets remaining, who had all sorts of questions about what she might write next—she made her way to the river. It was midday and a few of the girls were sitting on a bench tucked close to the wall of the little cottage.
“It’s our Printing Princess!” exclaimed the fruit seller, Margot, as she rose to usher Camille inside. “Has she brought something for us, Céline?”
“Come see!” Camille set the basket down on a worn table in the center of the room. The girls crowded around, lifting up the linen and pulling out bread and pastries, lemonade and cider. Giselle was quick to hand the prettiest pastry to Céline, who had to stand on her toes to peer inside the basket.
“Thank you, princess,” said Céline with her sweet lisp after she took a bite.
“You are all very welcome to it,” Camille said. She didn’t even care if they called her princess, she could hardly keep the smile from her face. “Do you know what’s happened? The pamphlets are selling so well the bookseller has asked for more!”
“Giselle’s pamphlet?” asked Claudine the lock picker, dressed as before in pants and a boy’s coat.
“Voilà.” Camille held up a copy. “Giselle’s story.”
The flower seller stared as if Camille had suddenly produced an elephant. “Truly? May I see?”
“I’ll read it for you,” said red-haired Odette, rising from her chair. Taking the pamphlet from Camille in her ink-splotched hands, she examined it carefully, then raised it to her nose. “Freshly printed.”
“Odette’s our writer,” tiny Henriette the forger said proudly. “Always thinking.”
“What do you write?” Camille asked, but Odette was already climbing onto a stool. Outside a river barge sailed by, sounding a horn. Odette waited for silence before she began. In her rich, commanding voice, the story unfolded, tragic but shining with Giselle’s love for her sister, and her hope.
As Giselle listened to Odette read, powerful emotions crossed her face. Though it was her own story, she looked as if she were hearing it for the first time. As if a play had been made of her life, and she was watching it.
Camille’s throat ached with happiness. It was powerful to be seen.
When Odette finished, no one said anything. The noises of the city and the plash of the river felt very far away. “Well, what do you think?” Camille asked Giselle.
Giselle considered. “Until you asked me to tell it, I didn’t think I had a story. Or a life, the way people say. What happened to me was only a jumble of things, all of them bad, and people who did cruel things. But hearing it written out in my own words,” she said, her voice catching, “I see it wasn’t my fault what had happened to me. And despite what they did, I survived.”
Survive was a word with edges, rough and strong and powerful. Tiny Henriette began to clap, and when the others joined in, Giselle took a little curtsey.
“You too, princess!” Céline demanded.
Camille obliged. “There’s something else.”
“Will wonders never cease?” Odette asked.
Her sharp questions hurt. Camille doubted Odette would ever accept her, but she told herself it didn’t matter. She unfolded the newspaper and pointed to the column that praised the pamphlet. “People are already becoming convinced it would be wrong to evict you.”
It was happening almost too fast, like dry wood catching fire. Like magic. But she would not let it worry her. “Imagine this. If we printed a few more stories and made it a series, it would be like a chorus. Many voices are more powerful than one. And since the first one is selling so well, people might pay in advance for a subscription to the rest to make sure they got the next one as soon as it