ACES ON BRIDGE

I think that we communicate only too well, in our silence, in what is unsaid, and that what takes place is a continual evasion, desperate rear-guard attempts to keep ourselves to ourselves. — Harold Pinter

When South opens a 15-17 no trump, North has a simple raise to game.Yes, he could invite game, but so often the more information you give away, the easier the defense becomes.

When West leads a spade, declarer must put the queen up from dummy, since if he plays low and East plays anything but the ace, the defenders will be able to run the spades as soon as they regain the lead. When the spade queen holds, declarer must try to develop diamonds while keeping East off lead, in case spades are 5-3 rather than 4-4.

So South leads a diamond toward his hand. When East plays low, declarer puts in the eight and West wins; his best move now is to shift to a top heart. Declarer ducks the queen, East encouraging the lead, then takes West’s heart jack with his ace. He unblocks the diamond ace, then cashes the club ace, leads the club nine to the king and tries to run the diamonds, pitching a small heart from hand on the last.

When diamonds break, South can cash 10 tricks. If they had failed to split, with West having the length, declarer would still have been able to bring home his game. He would run the clubs, ending in dummy, and after 10 tricks (one spade, two hearts, three diamonds and four clubs) he would exit with the fourth diamond, knowing West would win the trick and be endplayed to lead away from his spade ace. West would be unable to escape the endplay except by unblocking in diamonds, which would obviously lead to a worse fate.

ANSWER: North’s double is for takeout, since the opponents have announced a fit.Your soft cards in the black suits mean that your values may not be pulling their full weight, so I would just bid two diamonds, planning to compete again in diamonds if necessary.