Hercules, having gotten the Golden Apples of the Hesperides as his 11th Labor, was charged by King Eurystheus with a truly formidable task: to cross the River Styx and bring back the dreaded three-headed dog Cerberus.
“You may take the dog,” Hades told the great hero, “but on two conditions: one, that you use no weapons to subdue him; two, that you make 6NT in this deal after West leads a spade.”
Hercules eyed the North-south cards. Twelve tricks looked impossible. Even if he guessed right in diamonds and won a diamond trick, he would have only 11 tricks. Having no clue, Hercules appealed to Athena, the goddess of wisdom. And inspiration came.
“Strange things occur when declarer runs a long suit,” Athena whispered. So Hercules took five clubs, throwing hearts from dummy, and two more spades. With five tricks left, East had his diamonds, and West kept the K-J of hearts and Q-4-3 of diamonds.
At Trick Nine, dummy led the jack of diamonds. If East rose with the ace and led another diamond, declarer could win and lead a spade to dummy. On that trick, West would be squeezed, unable to keep the queen of diamonds and guard the king of hearts.
If instead East played low on the first diamond, Hercules would put up his king and lead a spade to dummy. West would have to bare his queen of diamonds to guard the king of hearts, and Hercules could exit with a diamond, endplaying the defender who won.
“Not bad,” Hades muttered. “We’ll look forward to having you on the Elysian Fields team.” West dealer
Both sides vulnerable