Here are the answers to Lateral Thinking Puzzles #4.
- The man was a skydiver. Diving from a plane, his parachute failed and he fell to his death in the middle of the field.
- When Joe receives White's move in the game in which he is playing Black, he sends that move as his move for the game in which he is playing White. When he receives Black's move in the game where he is playing white, he sends that move as his move for the other game. Proceeding in this manner both games will be identical, so Joe will either win one and lose the other, or draw both. Obviously, this sort of strategy is against the rules of most correspondence chess tournaments, but Joe has no scruples, remember?
- There was an electrical outage overnight. The two clocks that ran on battery power continued to show the correct time. The others did not.
- The fireman was the only man in the house. The carpenter, truck driver, and mechanic were women.
- She drew out a pebble, then dropped it onto the path where it was indistinguishable from all the other pebbles. "How clumsy of me," she said, "but the pebble in the bag must be the opposite colour to the one I drew." As the remaining pebble was black, and the moneylender dared not admit his dishonesty in front of the judge, both father and daughter were free.
- He received a used postage stamp.
- He put it in a suitcase 4 feet by 3 feet. The 5-foot pole could fit along the diagonal of the suitcase.
- Arrange the two planks as shown:
- He rode the elevator from the third floor to the second floor. The elevator then went to the first floor empty. After the other policeman passed the second floor on the stairwell, he took the stairs down to the first floor and left the building.
- The man is very short and can only reach as high as the button for the seventh floor.