A London Rubber Bridge Club, late at night.

You're sitting South, all vul.

What is your bid?

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

I bid 3. I hope no one in the audience duplicated my bid! It was an old-fashioned bid, but I was probably heading to 6NT, and I didn't want to squeal to the opponents about my spade suit. Perhaps I should have responded 1 and not squealed about the club suit either.

What now?

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

I bid Blackwood, 4NT. I wanted to bid the notrump before my partner bid it, because of my A-Q of spades. A 3 bid would risk him bidding 3NT.

Now what?

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

I bid 5NT. My plan was that over his kings reply, I would bid 6NT. If he had a lot extra, perhaps he would be able to bid 7NT, knowing how strong my hand was and knowing that we held all the aces (which 5NT would imply).

This was a strange thing! What would you do now?

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

I redoubled. This is well worth the risk at rubber bridge, or team scoring for that matter. Every one passed and the opening lead was the six of diamonds.

How would you play the hand?

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

My initial thoughts were that I had 9 red-suit tricks and two aces. West obviously held both black kings for his double. If he held the king-queen of clubs, I had an interesting position after cashing my red-suit winners. I would come down to the AQ of spades and AJ of clubs.

Can you envision the four-card end-position?

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

Here it is. Now I play the ace of clubs and a club to West and he must lead a spade into me.

But when I was reeling off my red suits, West discarded the 9 and 10 of clubs. I realized that with the KQ109 of clubs he would have led the king, instead of a diamond lead. So East must hold the queen of clubs and the true end position was West holding the K-J of spades and K-x of clubs?

Was there anything I could do about this?

 South
   A Q
   -
   -
   A J

If I cashed the ace of clubs, West was just good enough to play the king under it. That was no good. Then it occurred to me that I might double-cross him.

West didn't know which black queen I held. If I played the ace of spades instead of the ace of clubs, he might think I held Ax of spades and AQ of clubs!

I led a spade to my ace. Sure enough, he threw the king under this and I claimed my contract.

 South
   A Q
   -
   -
   A J

It was a terrible double by West, but his play at the end wasn't bad. He just fell victim to ... "the wrong queen."

 South
   A Q 6 5
   A J 9
   K 8
   A J 8 2

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