Daily Bridge Club

Cy is counted out

“I heard that you split with another girlfriend,” I said to Cy the Cynic. His romantic entanglements are constant.

“I liked her,” Cy said, “but she had this annoying habit of counting things all the time. We went to a restaurant and she counted the items on the menu. When I took her to a play, we sat in the back so she could count the house.”

“You broke up with her because you couldn’t handle all the counting?”

“Two weeks ago,” the Cynic sighed. “I wonder what she’s up to now.”

Cy has counting issues of his own. He became declarer at today’s four spades. (North’s 2NT response was an artificial forcing spade raise; 3NT would have been a better contract.) West led the queen of hearts. Cy took dummy’s ace and led a trump, and West won and led a second heart. East ruffed dummy’s king and led a diamond. Cy won, drew trumps and tried a club finesse with dummy’s jack, but East produced the queen. Cy also lost a heart to West and went down one.

Cy would succeed if he counted ... the East-West distribution. When East leads a diamond at the fourth trick, Cy should cash both the king and ace. He next leads a trump to dummy and ruffs the last diamond.

At that point, Cy knows West had six hearts, two trumps and at least three diamonds, hence no more than two clubs. So Cy can take the A-K of clubs next. When East-West follow low, Cy exits with a heart. He knows West has no more clubs — West started with only 13 cards — so West must lead a heart, and Cy ruffs in dummy and discards his club loser. South dealer N-S vulnerable