ACES ON BRIDGE

“A story to me means a plot where there is some surprise. Because that is how life is -- full of surprises. “

-- Isaac Bashevis Singer

Do you agree with North’s raise to three spades here? I would be unable to resist temptation, but he is undeniably at the very minimum end of the range for this call.

When West leads the club king against four spades, how should you plan to come to 10 tricks? After taking the opening lead in dummy with the ace, you should lead the heart six, planning to establish discards for your slow diamond losers.

East might well win and shift to diamonds, facilitating your task, but let us say he wins the heart ace to shift to his trump, a much more testing defense.

You must rise with the spade ace (to ensure you can take two ruffs in dummy ), then cash the diamond ace followed by the heart king and queen, on which youth row dummy’ s two remaining diamonds. At this point, you can crossruff four minor-suit tricks, leaving yourself with the queen and nine of spades in your hand.

You have already scored nine tricks, and when East follows to three diamonds and three clubs, he is marked with an original 1-6-3-3 pattern. That lets you exit from hand with the 13th diamond. West has no choice but to ruff this trick (he has followed suit obediently on every trick until now) and must lead away from his spade king at trick 12, giving you the game-going trick with your spade queen.

The only defense to the game was an extremely unlikely opening diamond lead. If they find that against you, it’s time to move on to an easier game.

ANSWER: The diamond and spade intermediates are just enough to tempt me to make one more call, even though it could easily be turning a plus score into a minus. A call of three hearts here shows real extras and approximately this hand pattern, letting partner decide whether to go to game -- and which strain to play in.