ACES ON BRIDGE

I never resist temptation because I have found that things that are bad for me do not tempt me.

— George Bernard Shaw

This deal is part of our weekly overview of a general theme: handling a suit where we are missing the queen and jack. When the auction has marked one defender as more likely than his partner to hold length in a suit, we have safety plays to guard against the bad split. Today’s deal is a horse of a slightly different color.

When West pre-empted with two spades, South doubled, to which his partner responded three clubs to show constructive values. With less, he would have used the Lebensohl convention, bidding two notrump as an artificial negative.

In four hearts, South ducked the spade lead, won the second round and noted that the only real danger was a hostile trump break. He could not guard against most breaks where

West was short, but he had a play that was technically sound and also gave the defenders a chance to err. After taking the spade ace, he led the heart nine from dummy, a play that would pin a bare eight in

West and would also allow East to fall from grace with a knee-jerk cover. East did precisely that by putting in the 10, and South won, collecting West’s queen in the process.

Declarer now led a diamond to the king and played a second trump, ducking East’s eight. East returned a diamond; declarer won his ace, crossed to the club ace and took the trump finesse, then drew the last trump. Then he played the club king and another club, conceding a club trick, after which his hand was high.

ANSWER: I would be unhappy about bidding either two or three clubs here. First, I might not have as much of a fit as I expected. Second, one call is an underbid, and the other overstates my offensive possibilities. I’d settle for a slightly flawed two-no-trump response, despite having only one diamond stopper. I’m the diamond jack short of my action — sue me!