Contract Bridge

Sylvia had a stubborn streak in her nature, and if she thought her opponents wanted her to do something, she would resist fiercely on the basis that anything good for her opponents was bad for her. This could, at times, make her a truly worthy adversary.

Here is a striking example of Sylvia’s thinking. She was playing as usual in the expert game and led a club against three notrump. Declarer ducked the king, as well as the queen, but won the next club with the ace as East discarded a low spade.

South observed that the diamonds were blocked, and, in the hope of catching the singleton queen, he cashed the king of diamonds at trick four. When the queen did not fall, South made the excellent play of the eight of clubs. He naturally thought Sylvia would cash both of her clubs, and he planned to discard the ten of diamonds from his hand when Sylvia cashed the last club. This would allow him to untangle the diamonds and so score the rest of the tricks.

But Sylvia eyed declarer’s club play with profound suspicion. It seemed obvious that South wanted her to cash her fifth club, and, being Sylvia, she firmly resisted the impulse. Instead, she returned the queen of diamonds!

This play knocked South clear out of the box. He could not duck the diamond because

Sylvia would then cash her good club to set the contract. So he took the ace and tried a spade finesse, which lost, whereupon Sylvia cashed her fifth club to add yet another triumph to her extraordinary collection. Tomorrow: Test your play -probabilities.