BRIDGE

If you have a two-way guess for a Queen, how do you decide which way to go?

As in today's notrump slam: play for the Queen to “sit over” the Jack (an old rubber bridge belief derived from manual shuffling of the cards but still thought of as accurate by many veterans)?

Maybe consult your horoscope for the day or perhaps dig out a purse-size ouija board? (Does anyone still have such a relic?).

Canadian star John Gowdy (Peterborough, Ontario) has a very unique way of solving such problems: look to your left, look to your right and finesse through the player you like least, the operative idea being to deny that player the pleasure of winning a trick via declarer's losing finesse.

One of John's regular Toronto-area opponents alleges he's yet to win a Queen trick in forty years of competition! Hmm!

Today's declarer used a smidgeon of inferential logic to “guess” the Queen's location when he won the opening spade lead, cashed his two top diamonds and continued with a heart to the Jack!

One losing club finesse later and he had his slam bonus secured.

Why go that way in hearts?

West had obviously tried to find a safe lead (and succeeded) against the notrump slam with the spade start. South reasoned that if seeking safety was the defender's motivation, he might just as easily have picked a heart lead unless he had something needing protection in that suit while he would never lead away from the heart Queen if he had it.

Of such slender bits of logic are winning plays made!