Voluptua’s great unblock

For once Voluptua Stitts was not partnering her boy-friend Randy Hardwick. So when she came to Randy’s table her competitive spirit came to the fore and she was very much on her mettle. Sorting her hand she found

♠8 ♥A ♦985432 ♣KQJT9

Randy was North and opened the bidding with 1♥. Voluptua’s partner was her aunt Frieda who made a Michaels cue bid of 2♥ showing spades and a minor. Gordon (South) leapt to 4♥ which was a pre- emptive bid with excellent heart support. It was now Voluptua’s first opportunity to bid and the level was already rather high. Which minor suit did Frieda have? Eventually she decided on bidding 5♦ thinking that she could correct to 6♣ if Frieda converted to spades. To her immense surprise, Frieda bid 7♦!!

Since Voluptua’s hand was a good deal better than she had already advertised she was quietly confident that she would make the contract easily. But then came a fly in the ointment – Randy bid 7♥, an obvious sacrifice.

This was just the irritating sort of thing that her boy-friend was inclined to do. She would not let him get away with it, so looking at her ♥A she firmly bid 7NT.

Randy, looking rather smug, doubled holding

♠KQJ4 ♥KQJ974 ♦— ♣732

This had been the auction: West North East South

West	North	East	South
	1♥	2♥	4♥
5♦	Pass	7♦	Pass
Pass	7♥	Pass	Pass
7NT	Dbl	Pass	Pass
Pass

Randy led ♥K and Voluptua gazed hopefully at Frieda’s dummy.

♠8 ♥A ♦985432 ♣KQJT9		♠A976532 ♥— ♦AKQJT ♣A

Oh dear! There seemed no way to make the contract because her magnificent clubs were blocked – and Randy was looking so supercilious. Drat him!

Suddenly the solution came to her, and she turned to Randy with a sweet and pitying smile. On the first trick she unblocked by discarding the ♣A. Then she played off the K, Q, J, T, 9 of clubs discarding her top 5 diamond honours from dummy. This left her with 6 diamond winners in her own hand, plus the ♠8 which was taken care of by dummy’s Ace.

The look on Randy’s face would be remembered for a very long time. He had, after all, led the only suit that gave Voluptua access to her hand. But Voluptua graciously did not point this out.

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