She attempted steering the motorcar ineffectually for a moment or two before it took matters into its own hands. The children were thrown back against their seats as it pivoted at a dangerous angle and hurtled down the street before Ernest could work out how to buckle his seatbelt. Various properties whizzed by in a colourful blur before the car delivered its four nauseated passengers outside a place called Squatters’ Swamp. The other properties had equally strange titles, none of which Milli and Ernest recognised from the game they knew so well. Squatters’ Swamp must have been the lowest-valued property on the board as it was more of a grimy millpond than valuable real estate. But valuable or not, our protagonists knew that business acumen was always rewarded in the game of Monopoly. Besides, judging by the speed with which Miss Pawpaw and Goblin Grouse were netting properties, the children would need to buy everything they landed on in order to keep up. ‘We’ll take it,’ Milli said.
