The Cheery Checkersmaster

The Alberts and Brian didn't get much sleep. Instead, they stayed up late trying to find the solution to their self-imposed checkers problem. They didn't find it, so they woke late and grouchy. When they stopped for lunch in a pleasant hillside meadow to eat, Al pulled out the board without a word and the heat was on once more. They had been at it for over an hour, when a young shepherd in homespun wandered over with his dog to see what in the heck was wrong with the strangers.

"Ah!" he exclaimed in delight upon seeing the board. "You like checkers, then? May I play? I'm pretty good."

"I'm sorry," responded Al rather absently, "We aren't playing a proper game. We're trying to see if we can cooperatively king all the pieces without taking any."

"That sounds like fun!" chirruped the shepherd. "May I try, too?"

They accommodatingly moved over to let him join the circle. Misery (and bafflement) loves company, after all. But he didn't fulfill his role properly. Instead of staring drearily at the board and trying various things that rapidly dead-ended, the young man settled down to some serious kinging. First he got six. Then he got a dozen, which was more than the trio had gotten. As they watched in rather bitter disbelief he tried one more time and succeeded where they had failed.

He looked around at them happily. "That was fun! A fine puzzle. I haven't seen such a good one in quite a while."

Al had to quietly restrain Bert, who clearly wanted to give the upstart a smacking: some bruises to relieve his own bruised pride. He shook his head at his brother, then turned back to the oblivious lad.

"You like checkers puzzles, then?"

"Oh, yes! I like to play, too, but of course I don't get to do that so often, being up here all alone most of the time."

"I have a nice little checkers puzzle that an old man showed me once. I'll bet you a silver that you can't do it in five minutes."

He looked at Al rather thoughtfully. "There is a solution?" he checked.

"Oh, yes," Al assured him.

The lad grinned again. "Sure! Why not. Show me this puzzle."

Al put down the a checkers layout, and stated, "White can force black to block himself into a stalemate. How?"

[It is a little hard to see: the two bottom red pieces are kinged, and the white piece in the lower right is kinged; note, too, that the rule presented as additional in the last puzzle - a player must jump if he can - is in fact a general checkers rule. White is going up, red is going down]

Solution