ACES ON BRIDGE

Words ought to be a little wild, for they are the assault of thoughts on the unthinking. — John Maynard Keynes

Cover up the South and West cards for today’s hand. As East, you hear North-South bid briskly to four hearts. Partner leads the spade queen, won in dummy as you contribute the four.

Given the spade nine in dummy, you cannot afford to waste the 10-spot since that would set up a finesse against partner. Then comes a diamond from dummy. How should you defend?

If declarer has the diamond king, your play is unlikely to matter. The important case arises when declarer holds queen-10-low and is seeking to establish a discard for dummy’s third spade.

Then, you must rise with the diamond ace to clear spades before partner’s diamond king (his sole entry) is knocked out. The defense comes to two diamonds, a spade and a slow heart trick.

If instead you were to make the knee-jerk reaction of playing low on the first diamond, declarer’s 10 would force partner’s king. Declarer would win the next spade, cross to dummy and play another diamond up. You could take the diamond ace but would not be able to reach partner’s hand to cash a spade. Dummy’s third spade would disappear on the diamond queen.

This theme of second hand playing high, not low, is more common when defending against a no-trump contract. When partner has led his long suit and it has yet to be established, it may be desirable for you to take your entry first and play on partner’s suit, preserving his entry for when his suit has been set up.

Pass 3 NT All pass

ANSWER: Lead the spade queen. This auction screams for a major-suit lead. Although it is traditional to lead a low card against no-trump when you have only a two-card honor sequence, the suit is unlikely to block here. It is safer to lead the queen. If your spade eight were the three, the decision would be closer. Against a suit, I’d need a lot of persuading not to lead an honor.