DAILY BRIDGE CLUB

“Do you think you’ll ever marry again?” I asked Cy the Cynic in the club lounge.

“I like playing the field,” Cy shrugged. “A wedding band is bad for one’s circulation.”

In a penny game, Cy was declarer at today’s 3NT. West led a club, and East took the king and returned a club, forcing out dummy’s ace. Cy next led a diamond to his queen and a diamond back to dummy’s jack, but East played low. The Cynic then started the hearts and forced out East’s ace, but he won only two tricks in each suit. Down one.

Cy’s circulation — as in the flow of blood to his brain — appeared to be impaired. Cy must start the hearts at Trick Three. Say East takes the ace immediately and leads another club. (He has no better defense.) Cy wins, unblocks his Q-J of hearts and leads a diamond. He is sure to reach dummy to take the ten of hearts and wins nine tricks in all.

“You better be wary of playing the field,” Unlucky Louie told Cy. “That’s what I did, and I caught a foul ball.” DAILY QUESTION You hold:

ner opens one club, the next player bids one spade, and you make a negative double (suggesting length in the unbid suits). Partner bids two hearts. What do you say?

ANSWER: Your partner’s bid is not a strength-showing “reverse,” as it would have been if you had responded one spade and his second bid had been two hearts. He has merely “raised” the suit your double implied. Pass. East dealer

N-S vulnerable