# she called me as if she<were><had been>my wife.



## sagar grammar

Namaste,
Dear members.

Please tell me if both of them are possible or any one of them should be preferred.

She called me as if she ____ my wife.
1- were
2- had been

Well, the book answered #2, I think they both will work, and I liked the #1 even better. 

Please correct me if I am wrong, and throw some light on this issue.

Thanks in advance.


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## Hermione Golightly

I think there are present and past considerations.

She's constantly nagging me as if she were my wife. ( She's not)
She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife ( She wasn't)

However there's a potential ambiguity about the second: it suggests that the woman had once been the speaker's wife in a  time _before _the nagging started. What's more, at this time in  the past when she nagged she is not his wife so there's no reason to change the tense. The unreality expressed by were holds good whether the nagging was in the past or now.

I would use 'were' in both.


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## Thomas Tompion

Hermione Golightly said:


> She's constantly nagging me as if she were my wife. ( She's not)
> She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife ( She wasn't)



I read 2. rather differently from Hermione.

For me it's ambiguous.  It could mean either of these:

a. it could be saying that at one time (Y) she nagged me as if at an earlier time (X) she had once been my wife.

We agree that X is an earlier time than Y, but Hermione, as I understand her, says


Hermione Golightly said:


> it suggests that the woman had once been the speaker's wife in a time _before _the nagging started


 *as if she had been* to me implies that the woman had never been the speaker's wife.  So I'd read it like this:

She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife (She *hadn't been*)

Hermione puts She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife ( She wasn't) but seems to me to argue for She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife (She *had been*)

b.  The past perfect (she had been) may not be referring to an earlier time at all, but the sentence (2. in the OP) could be saying that

She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife (She wasn't) (Hermione's second example - quoted  at the top of this post).

In other words, her manner of nagging back at that moment (Y) was like that of a wife.  No anterior time (X) is implied.

I agree that changing the *had been* to *were *would remove the ambiguity but I'm uneasy with it, because it feels like a past version of *She nags me as if she were my wife *where the speaker has failed to shift the tense, as necessary, in the (as if)-clause.



sagar grammar said:


> Please tell me if both of them are possible or any one of them should be preferred.


So, I prefer 2. despite its ambiguity.

1. is just possible, and is the kind of thing you hear every day from quite educated natives.  For me, it removes the ambiguity but feels slightly clumsy.


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## sagar grammar

Thomas Tompion said:


> I read 2. rather differently from Hermione.
> 
> For me it's ambiguous.  It could mean either of these:
> 
> a. it could be saying that at one time (Y) she nagged me as if at an earlier time (X) she had once been my wife.
> 
> We agree that X is an earlier time than Y, but Hermione, as I understand her, says
> *as if she had been* to me implies that the woman had never been the speaker's wife.  So I'd read it like this:
> 
> She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife (She *hadn't been*)
> 
> Hermione puts She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife ( She wasn't) but seems to me to argue for She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife (She *had been*)
> 
> b.  The past perfect (she had been) may not be referring to an earlier time at all, but the sentence (2. in the OP) could be saying that
> 
> She constantly nagged me as if she had been my wife (She wasn't) (Hermione's second example - quoted  at the top of this post).
> 
> In other words, her manner of nagging back at that moment (Y) was like that of a wife.  No anterior time (X) is implied.
> 
> I agree that changing the *had been* to *were *would remove the ambiguity but I'm uneasy with it, because it feels like a past version of *She nags me as if she were my wife *where the speaker has failed to shift the tense, as necessary, in the (as if)-clause.
> So, I prefer 2. despite its ambiguity.
> 
> 1. is just possible, and is the kind of thing you hear every day from quite educated natives.  For me, it removes the ambiguity but feels slightly clumsy.


Thank you.


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## sagar grammar

sagar grammar said:


> She called me as if she ____ my wife.
> 1- were
> 2- had been
> 
> Well, the book answered #2, I think they both will work, and I liked the #1 even better.


The reason why I thought is that I understand;-

1- She called me as if she were my wife.

(But she is not my wife), I believe a person must know about his relationships I, the subject to our sentence, know that she is not my wife.)
2- She called me as if she had been my wife.

  ( But she was not my wife), if I consider it correct, it would mean , to me, her being my wife was a past unreality , but perhaps not a present reality , means "she was not my wife that time but perhaps she is now my wife. ( left in ambiguity)"
Or, it suggests that she Is my wife now.
So, it is possible when the unreality was just in past not in present, is that a reason why we prefer #2 instead of #1 as the sentence started with a past indefinite tense?
This thing came from here;-
3- He called me as if he were my FATHER.
4- He called me as if he had been my father. 

#4 here can never be possible as a person is not possible being one's father in past but he is now. That's not even possible.


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## JulianStuart

I have not sorted out all the posts above, but is there a possibility that she is no longer alive? If so, how would that affect the discussion?  (If that is so, then "She called me" could be the habitual form)


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## sagar grammar

JulianStuart said:


> but is there a possibility that she is no longer alive? If so, how would that affect the discussion?


Yes, that's true. #2 goes right then.

Thank you very much.


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## Thomas Tompion

I think if she was no longer alive then she wouldn't have been able to call him unless we are suspending the normal laws of physics, chemistry, and biology.


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## JulianStuart

Thomas Tompion said:


> I think if she was no longer alive then she wouldn't have been able to call him unless we are suspending the normal laws of physics, chemistry, and biology.


This comment: (If that is so, then "She called me" could be the habitual form) was intended to mean a habit in the past.  She went to France every year. She called me as if ...


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## Thomas Tompion

JulianStuart said:


> This comment: (If that is so, then "She called me" could be the habitual form) was intended to mean a habit in the past.  She went to France every year. She called me as if ...


I'm sorry, Julian.  I'm lost.  Are you saying that both are possible?  And that they mean different things?

Or do you think only one of them is possible?


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## Loob

sagar grammar said:


> She called me as if she ____ my wife.
> 1- were
> 2- had been


I can't imagine saying either of them.


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## JulianStuart

Thomas Tompion said:


> I'm sorry, Julian.  I'm lost.  Are you saying that both are possible?  And that they mean different things?
> 
> Or do you think only one of them is possible?


I hadn't spent much time looking at the rest of the sentence but I'd go with #1 - (When she was in France) She called me as if she were my wife (pretending to be my wife).


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## Loob

So "called" would mean "telephoned"?

I'm sorry: I find the sentence in the OP decidedly strange, whichever verb-form is used.


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## JulianStuart

Loob said:


> So "called" would mean "telephoned"?
> 
> I'm sorry: I find the sentence in the OP decidedly strange, whichever verb-form is used.


I agree - only analysing it for strictly grammatical purposes - and yes, I interpreted called as telephoned


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## Thomas Tompion

Loob said:


> So "called" would mean "telephoned"?
> 
> I'm sorry: I find the sentence in the OP decidedly strange, whichever verb-form is used.


How would you say it then, Loob?  How would you express the idea?

_She used to ring me up pretending to be my wife_?


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## Loob

Your rewrite would be fine by me, TT (unsurprisingly).


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## wandle

I take 'called me' to mean 'called out to me' or 'summoned me', and the 'as if' clause to mean 'with the familiarity or expectancy of a spouse'.
The implication is that the woman was not at any time the speaker's wife, but addressed him in such a way that a third party would think the two were married.

On that basis, 'as if she had been' is, as *Thomas Tompion* indicates, the correct past version of the present unreal condition 'as if she were'.


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## Thomas Tompion

Loob said:


> Your rewrite would be fine by me, TT (unsurprisingly).


But I've wondered if it might not mean:

_She used to ring me up, just as a wife would._

I don't think I can surprise you twice in a thread, Loob.


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## siares

Thomas Tompion said:


> a past version of *She nags me as if she were my wife *where the speaker has failed to shift the tense, as necessary, in the (as if)-clause.


Why is it necessary to shift the tenses if the 'as if' is still true?
He drew the Earth as if it had been flat / were flat. - aren't both acceptable?



sagar grammar said:


> 4- He called me as if he had been my father.
> 
> #4 here can never be possible as a person is not possible being one's father in past but he is now. That's not even possible.


What do you think of this point? It seems to be mixing grammar with logic.
From that it seems that, according to OP source, past perfect is possible in the 'wife' sentence only because the 'being wife' is seen as completed/changed status; rather than because of any back-shifting.


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## Loob

siares said:


> Why is it necessary to shift the tenses if the 'as if' is still true?
> He drew the Earth as if it had been flat / were flat. - aren't both acceptable?.


The "had been" version doesn't work for me, siares*. That may be because what I would be backshifting is a present-tense version _He draws the earth as if it's flat._


(*I recognise I'm disagreeing with TT here.)


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## Thomas Tompion

Loob said:


> The "had been" version doesn't work for me, siares*. That may be because what I would be backshifting is a present-tense version _He draws the earth as if it's flat._





Loob said:


> (*I recognise I'm disagreeing with TT here.)



I'll do what I usually do on such occasions, try to show that the form is used quite often by people.  Here are three examples from the British Corpus:

_She felt heavy-lidded and drowsy, as if she had been asleep for a week. Stone Cold,_ John Francome, Headline Book Pub. plc, 1990, pp. 61-197.

_At Puente Ruinas she lost her glasses and we all searched for them as if she had been our lifelong friend.  In the palace of serpents._ Tom Pow,  Edinburgh: Canongate Press plc, 1992, 

_ In the end, he simply stared at her, shaking his head as if she had been the one to ask the question.  Conjure me. _Jack Curtis, London: Corgi Books, 1993 

I'm afraid I just don't see the problem.  Maybe I'm not looking in the right place.  It seems to me to be quite a normal way of talking.


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## wandle

siares said:


> Why is it necessary to shift the tenses if the 'as if' is still true?


If we accept the scenario envisaged in post 17, which seems to me the most likely interpretation, there is no reason to think that the lady in question has any relationship at all with the speaker at the time of speaking. She may be dead, or they may now be living at opposite ends of the world.

That being so, it is natural to backshift the original thought in the speaker's mind, which would have been:
_'She is calling me as if she were my wife'._


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## Loob

Thomas Tompion said:


> I'll do what I usually do on such occasions, try to show that the form is used quite often by people.  Here are three examples from the British Corpus:
> 
> _She felt heavy-lidded and drowsy, as if she had been asleep for a week. Stone Cold,_ John Francome, Headline Book Pub. plc, 1990, pp. 61-197.
> 
> _At Puente Ruinas she lost her glasses and we all searched for them as if she had been our lifelong friend.  In the palace of serpents._ Tom Pow,  Edinburgh: Canongate Press plc, 1992,
> 
> _ In the end, he simply stared at her, shaking his head as if she had been the one to ask the question.  Conjure me. _Jack Curtis, London: Corgi Books, 1993
> 
> I'm afraid I just don't see the problem.  Maybe I'm not looking in the right place.  It seems to me to be quite a normal way of talking.


Your red sentences look OK to me, TT. I'd see the present tense equivalents as:
_She feels heavy-lidded and drowsy, as if she *has been* asleep for a week. _
_At Puente Ruinas she loses her glasses and we all search for them as if she *has been *our lifelong friend. _
_In the end, he simply stares at her, shaking his head as if she *has been* the one to ask the question. _


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## siares

Thanks, Loob.
Hello, wandle, I am so pleased to see you back on the forum!


wandle said:


> If we accept the scenario envisaged in post 17


This is where called = summoned, a one-off rather than habitual act.
I don't understand whether this is relevant to the tenses?


wandle said:


> there is no reason to think that the lady in question has any relationship at all with the speaker at the time of speaking. ...*.*That being so, it is natural to backshift the original thought in the speaker's mind


I do remember form previous threads that using past perfect in 3rd conditional almost precludes the condition from being true.
Is that the reason why speaker wants to backshift here - to achieve the past perfect form?

Because then I would be guessing that there are two opposing forces, one speaks for backshift (obvious unreality, as in conditional 3) and another against (the unreality is lasting).

Could I ask, what do you think of the Earth sentence?


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## wandle

siares said:


> Hello, wandle, I am so pleased to see you back on the forum!


Thanks, but I can only look in occasionally now.

It seems more likely to me that 'called' in the OP means by voice rather than by phone. It could be just calling out to him, or calling him to come to her. For all we know, either of these actions could be single or habitual.

It could merely be a simple one-off on some past occasion and we have no ground to construct any relationship going beyond that. In other words, we have no reason to think that the speaker has any idea in his mind of an ongoing state of affairs. or that he is thinking of her in the present day in any way.

For the purposes of a test or a teaching example, we should use all the information given, but not add to it. We should not be constructing scenarios beyond what is needed. Hence I see no reason to attribute to the speaker's words any present significance, one way or the other.


siares said:


> He drew the Earth as if it had been flat / were flat. - aren't both acceptable?


We can relate these to two original present tense versions:
(a) He draws the Earth as if it were flat.
(b) He draws the Earth as if it is flat.

When we convert these to the past, they become:
(a¹) He drew the Earth as if it had been flat.
(b¹) He drew the Earth as if it were flat.

That is the correct way to backshift each of those originals.

In my view, only (a) is strictly correct as the original present tense version.
However, (b) is commonly used, both in written and spoken English, and I do not believe any newspaper editor would object to it.


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## siares

Thank you, wandle.


wandle said:


> we have no reason to think that the speaker has any idea in his mind of an *ongoing state of affairs*. or that he is thinking of her in the present day in any way.





wandle said:


> Hence I see no reason to attribute to the speaker's words any *present significance*, one way or the other.


In other threads on backshifting or not of unchanged facts the idea of present significance was never mentioned.
This is a quote from locked thread by Thomas Tompion:


> If the fact being reported *remains true*, you can backshift, or you can omit to do so, keeping the present tense in the reported speech.
> You may prefer not to backshift if you wish to stress the present or, maybe, urgent - _he said the fire engine is on its way_ - nature of the fact.


Here we have a situation remaining _untrue, _an ongoing non-state of affairs.
Are the criteria for backshifting or not the same? Is the present significance the extra criterium here?

If I don't correctly backshift the Earth sentence: (scientific truth)
_he drew it as if it were flat_
are the implications very different to those of not backshifting the sentence about one's personal situation
_she called me as if she had been my wife ?_


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## Loob

All I can say is that ""She called me as if she had been my wife" seems even odder to me than "She called me as if she were my wife".


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## JulianStuart

Loob said:


> All I can say is that ""She called me as if she had been my wife" seems even odder to me than "She called me as if she were my wife".


A plaintive cry from the back of the room at the séance perhaps?


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## siares

But the oddity you comment on is in the verb, right? You would be happy with a backshift in: She spoke to me as if she had been my wife?


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## Loob

siares said:


> But the oddity you comment on is in the verb, right? You would be happy with a backshift in: She spoke to me as if she had been my wife?


No, I wouldn't.  Unless the meaning was "She spoke to me as if she had, previously, been married to me".  Which is pretty weird....


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## siares

Thanks, Loob.
So, backshifting the verb after 'as if' seems to work not entirely the same way as backshifting verbs in normal reported speech (which is the only context I experienced backshifting taught in). What book are you quoting from, sagar grammar?


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## Loob

I think the problem relates to the present tense version of the sentence rather than backshifting, siares.

For me, _She speaks to me as if she were my wife _doesn't work_.  _

Wandle seems happy with the construction, however.


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## siares

Aha!
So you would use speaks / is as if + present tense in the Earth sentence and the wife one.
Would you please give a sentence that you would use with as if + were - that would then be natural to backshift - and maybe explain in what ways it differs from these two?


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## Loob

No, I'm sorry: I can't think of a sentence in which I would use "as if X were". I can think of sentences in which I would use "as if X was" - but they would already be past-tense sentences.


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## siares

Loob said:


> "as if X was" - but they would already be past-tense sentences.


I don't understand this, could you eplain?
I saw before  that BE, in conditionals, sometimes makes a distinction between impossible (were) and merely non-factual (was) when talking of *present* conditions.


Thomas Tompion said:


> I could say_ If I was not blind _- suggesting that maybe I believe I'm going to be cured - or_ If I were not blind_ - suggesting that I think a cure is out of the question.


I don't know whether this difference between was and were works in 'as if' construction too, inbackshifting a thing 'as if I was not blind', what do you think?


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## Thomas Tompion

Loob said:


> No, I'm sorry: I can't think of a sentence in which I would use "as if X were". I can think of sentences in which I would use "as if X was" - but they would already be past-tense sentences.


I'm surprised, Loob.

What do you feel about these? 

_You can't feel benevolent and sympathetic, you can't just want everything to be nice, as if Jack were a child, and as if I were a child._ The Message to the Planet. Murdoch, Iris. London: Chatto & Windus Ltd, 1989, pp. 112-198.

'_You could say that a great many English women are still metaphorically wearing the yashmak,' she said now, speaking with a kind of didactic, impersonal severity, as if I were a studio audience._ A Woman of my Age. Bawden, Nina. London: Virago Press Ltd, 1991, pp. 15-131.

_But with Son being here, talking about it once in a while when she gets a bit down, and don't we all -- well, I feel like it all happened last week, and what's more as if I was in the middle of it._ The L-shaped room. Banks, Lynne Reid. London: Penguin Group, 1987, pp. 98-206.

_Sometimes it can seem as if it was yesterday.  Other times, it is __as if I was writing about someone else._ East Anglian Daily Times.


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## Loob

Sorry, TT and siares: my post 34 was overly cryptic. I was answering siares' question:


siares said:


> Would you please give a sentence that you would use with as if + were *- *that would then be natural to backshift


 And I was taking/using "were" as shorthand for "past subjunctive".
I'm afraid I still can't think of such a sentence.
____
Edit: I'll bow out - I think I'm muddying the waters rather than clarifying


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## wandle

siares said:


> In other threads on backshifting or not of unchanged facts the idea of present significance was never mentioned.
> This is a quote from locked thread by Thomas Tompion:


"If the fact being reported *remains true*, you can backshift, or you can omit to do so, keeping the present tense in the reported speech.
You may prefer not to backshift if you wish to stress the present or, maybe, urgent - _he said the fire engine is on its way_ - nature of the fact."

That quote from *Thomas Tompion* does in fact say 'if you wish to stress the present ... nature of the fact'.

Now in *sagar grammar's* example there is a subtlety we need to recognise. On the original occasion, when the speaker says to himself (thinking in present time), 'She is calling me as if she were my wife', he is not only formulating a thought in his own mind, but also one in her mind. He is expressing his view of what she thinks or feels. It is equivalent to 'as if she thought she were my wife'.

That implication is all the evidence we have as to the lady's state of mind, and it is limited to the occasion that the speaker is talking about. We have no way to judge whether that thought in her mind continued afterwards or not. All the speaker says is that it was in her mind at that particular time. We are not entitled to make any assumption beyond that, and thus we should accept that it is limited to the past occasion.

That is why I was indicating that we are not in a position to regard this as a case of a reported fact which remains true.

In any case, I do not accept the view that there is a free choice not to backshift when a reported fact remains true.
In the fire engine example, there are in my view only two correct options:
(a) 'He says the fire engine is on its way';
(b) 'He said the fire engine was on its way'.

This is in line with the BBC's practice in news programmes, as well as with what I was taught and what I believe is still taught in good schools.

As a matter of fact, in the fire engine case the speaker does not take it on himself to say that the fire engine is coming: he is presenting it as the other person's assertion.
Thus it is not really a case of a fact remaining true. The sentence is just as valid if the other person was mistaken (or lying).


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## siares

Thanks Loob, Thomas Tompion, wandle.


wandle said:


> lady's state of mind


Aha! Now I got what you meant y the present relevance. How very interesting.
All this time, I took the sentence to means: she acts as I imagine a wife would act. (bloke's state of mind).
whereas you take it ot mean: ahe acts as if she felt herself to be in a wife-like relationship to me. (her state of mind)

I can't tell which of these is more likely!

In this, it is obvious that the impression is not assigned to the person talked about, only to the speaker:
To my ear, she is talking so well as if she were a native speaker.

Then the Earth sentence is a completely different cup of tea, becuase neither of the humans have indivudual feelings about Earth being such or such.



wandle said:


> This is in line with the BBC's practice in news programmes


I can't accept this, unless you are talking about live broadcast from a studio that was on fire.


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## wandle

siares said:


> I can't accept this,


What do you mean? BBC news presenters and reporters scrupulously observe back shifting. Theirs is a job which involves a great deal of reported speech and I have never noticed a mistake.


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## siares

wandle said:


> What do you mean?


Oh that was a silly joke - that BBC are unfailingly correct when commenting on fire happening to someone else, but who knws whether they would stick to correct practices if themselves in acute fear for their lives (and desperate for fire engine).


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## Thomas Tompion

siares said:


> Oh that was a silly joke - that BBC are unfailingly correct when commenting on fire happening to someone else, but who knws whether they would stick to correct practices if themselves in acute fear for their lives (and desperate for fire engine).


It's wrong, of course, to talk of omitting to shift as an error.  There are many occasions where not shifting would be fully justified.


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