THE ACES ON BRIDGE

“Which of us ... is to do the hard and dirty work for the rest -- and for what pay? Who is to do the pleasant and clean work, and for what pay?” -- John Ruskin .....................

In today’s deal, the bidding wound its way to six diamonds by South, when South elected not to make a simple rebid of three no-trump over two no-trump. Instead, he repeated his diamonds and North cooperated once, then went all the way to slam when South indicated suitability for higher things by going to the fourlevel.

Against the slam West found the best lead: the spade six. Declarer won with dummy’s ace, and it was clear to him that if the diamond queen fell in two rounds, he could discard a loser on the third round of clubs, ultimately losing just one heart trick.

Care had to be taken though, to preserve entries to the North hand, should diamonds misbehave. Accordingly, declarer played a diamond to the ace, then the seven to the king, carefully conserving the trump two. When the queen did not drop, it now became necessary for the club suit to provide four tricks, for both a spade and a heart discard.

Since the lead was in dummy, where it needed to be, a small club was led and the 10 was successfully finessed. The club queen was cashed and dummy re-entered with the heart ace. The club ace came next, on which the spade loser was discarded, and although East ruffed the third club with the master trump, declarer could re-enter dummy with the thoughtfully preserved diamond two to North’s four, so that the heart loser could be pitched on the remaining high club.