If you hiccup once, you hiccup again

Audrey Hepburn said, “There must be something wrong with those people who think Audrey Hepburn doesn’t perspire, hiccup or sneeze, because they know that’s not true. In fact, I hiccup more than most.”

But she didn’t hiccup over her lines. In this Bridge Base Online deal, some pairs hiccuped. Look at the South hand. West opens three hearts at unfavorable vulnerability, North makes a takeout double, and East passes. What should South do?

This is not easy. One South just jumped to six diamonds, but that risked losing two quick heart tricks. (At another table, East raised to four hearts, which made the slam leap safer.) An alternative was to cuebid four hearts, then rebid five diamonds to show slam interest. (With only game ambition, South would have jumped straight to five diamonds.) However, although North has the bare heart ace, his hand is relatively weak. I could understand his passing.

Six diamonds is not laydown, especially if West finds a spade lead. Then you have to guess clubs, taking two finesses (risking West’s having 10-doubleton). After a heart lead, though, you can take these 12 tricks: one spade, one heart, five diamonds, four clubs and a heart ruff in the North hand.

At one table, three hearts was passed out. Who should have entered the auction?

It is not clear-cut, but I think both North and South should have doubled, that call being the most flexible way into the auction. As Edgar Kaplan used to say, more points are lost with cautious passes than with aggressive calls.