Neither vulnerable. East deals.

March 4, 2009 at 12:00a.m.

NORTH

xK 8

uJ 6 5

vQ 6 3

wK Q 8 5 3

WEST EAST

x5 x10 9

uQ 10 9 8 3 2 uA 7 4

vK J 10 5 vA 9 8

w6 2 wA J 10 9 4

SOUTH

xA Q J 7 6 4 3 2

v7 4 2

The bid ding:

EAST SOUTH WEST NORTH

1w 1x Dbl 1NT

Pass 2x 3u Pass

4u 4x Pass Pass

Dbl Pass Pass Pass

Opening lead: Six of w

With only 15 words available to you with which to describe your holding, you might be able to describe the length of your suits and your overall high-card strength. You have to find some other means to show where your high cards are located, and you might be able to do so by the order in which you elect to follow suit. Here’s an example from a pairs event at the recent Fall North American Championships held in Boston, reported by Mark Itabashi.

West’s double of one spade was negative, showing the unbid suits and limited values. The rest of the bidding was normal and four spades had a good shot — indeed, it was made most times it was the final contract.

West led the higher of his clubs, East captured dummy’s queen with the ace and declarer dropped the seven. East, unsure of who held the deuce of clubs, tried to get a clue by shifting to the ace of hearts, dropping declarer’s king.

From the bidding, it was clear to West that his partner had to have the ace of diamonds, and that East had to underlead that card to permit a diamond lead through dummy. He found the way to tell partner — he dropped the queen of hearts under the ace! That was not only a suit preference, it guaranteed a winning high card. East duly shifted to a low diamond, and the defenders collected three diamond tricks for down two and a top score.

2009 Tribune Media Services