IT TAKES IMAGINATION TO FIND A FALSECARD

Tom Stoppard, in his play "Artist Descending a Staircase," wrote, "Skill without imagination is craftsmanship and gives us many useful objects, such as wickerwork picnic baskets. Imagination without skill gives us modern art."

Imagination with skill gives us bridge magicians. See if you can spot an imaginative piece of sorcery in today's deal. What happens in the four-heart contract after West leads the spade queen?

North made a negative double, which promised four hearts, length in the unbid major. If he had fewer than 10 high-card points, he might have had five or six hearts. Note that North did well to look for a 4-4 heart fit and not plunge straight into three no-trump, a contract that would have gone down two.

If we have an unimaginative player sitting West, the play goes like this: spade to the king, heart to the queen, spade to the ace, club ace, club queen overtaken by the king, and club jack, discarding the spade four from the board. Declarer ruffs his last spade and plays another trump. He loses only two hearts and one diamond.

A sneaky West, though, wins the first round of trumps with his ace, not the queen! Then, when South wins the next trick with dummy's spade ace, he may think that he can afford to take another heart finesse and, if trumps are 3-2, draw trumps. Then he would be able to drive out the diamond ace and claim an overtrick. Here, though, West produces the heart queen out of his wickerwork picnic basket. Then he cashes the spade 10 and diamond ace for down one.