White to mate in two

[FEN "3Bk2r/1N4pr/2nQ2Pp/8/3n4/8/6K1/8 w - - 0 1"]

Solution

[Index of Chessprints]

Position of the Week: Solution
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Barnes captioned this problem "Why Can't Black Castle?", referring, of course, to the position after 1.Qc7.  He writes: "There is always room for a chess problem, however elementary, which makes the solver smile.

Here, the composer wants the solver to believe that the key 1.Qc7! (which apparently lets Black Castle with the guard on f8 abandoned) cannot be right because when Black makes the Castling move White is unable to mate.

But look at that Black Rook on h7.  How did it get there?  The answer is only via h8, and in doing so it must have displaced the existing Black Rook on h8 (or it is the original Black Rook from h8), and Black has clearly lost the right to Castle.  1.Qc7! is correct!"

Barnes, for the uninitiated, is (was?) an IM, Judge of the FIDE Committee for Chess Composition, 1st Vice-President of the FIDE Problem Chess Commission, and Editor for 18 years of the two-move section of the famous composing magazine The Problemist.

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