‘Thanks, that’s no help.’
‘Make a guess,’ suggested Ella, who had no idea. ‘Think of old weights and measures. They were all funny amounts.’
‘You’re not supposed to give her clues.’ Devon pulled a face at her.
‘Twelve,’ said Bets.
Devon glared at Ella. ‘See.’
‘How was that a clue? I was trying to get Bets to think laterally.’
‘It was a clue because there are twelve inches in a foot,’ crowed Bets, wriggling in her seat with a smug shoulder shimmy.
‘Oops,’ said Ella, shooting Devon a mischievous grin. ‘But she could have gone for the number of ounces in a pound.’
‘I would if I knew.’
They carried on playing and when Ella and Devon were level, with almost a full pie of pieces each, Ella felt her head start to droop. Thankfully the game was nearly over.
Bets threw again and landed on an orange square. ‘Blast. I’m rubbish at sport. Jack normally answers these ones.’ Her track record this evening suggested she wasn’t much better at history, science, art and literature or geography.
Devon read the card. ‘Yeah, I think you might need to phone a friend on this one. Who was the first simultaneous holder of the Masters, Open, US Open and PGA titles?’
‘What?’ She stuck her chin out and scrunched up her face, looking like a recalcitrant toddler.
‘I’m going to have to hurry you for an answer.’
‘I have no idea. Andre Agassi.’
‘No! That’s tennis, you numpty. The Masters is golf.’
‘Well, how was I supposed to know that?’
Devon shook his head and threw the dice. ‘Science, green.’
Bets pulled out a card. ‘I don’t flipping believe it. What items of cricket equipment share their name with mammals that fly? Well, that’s a tricky one.’
‘Bat?’ Devon didn’t even try to hide his glee.
‘I think you should have another one because that was too easy.’ Bets grumbled.
He threw again this time, landing on a brown one. ‘Art and Lit. I hate these. Will you be my phone a friend?’ he asked Ella.
She looked pointedly at her piece and his. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Which artist had a blue period?’
‘What, was he depressed?’ asked Devon.
‘There were plenty of those,’ quipped Ella.
‘I bet you know this one, don’t you?’
‘I could hazard a guess,’ hedged Ella with a smug grin.
‘Do you know, you two ought to go on a quiz team together,’ Bets suddenly said. ‘You’d be brilliant. There’s that one at the Old Boot in Tring. Ella could do the brown, pink and yellow and you could the blue, green and orange.’
‘And I can do the brown, too,’ said Devon with a sudden triumphant grin. ‘Picasso.’
