The use of tenses in indirect questions is the same as in the indirect discourse ([§ 434]).
- The constable inquired whether (or if) I lived in Casterbridge. [His question was: Do you live in Casterbridge?]
- Your father wishes to know if you have been playing truant. [Direct question: Have you been playing truant?]
- I considered whether I should apply to Kent or to Arnold. [Direct question: Shall I apply to Kent or to Arnold?]
443. Indirect questions are usually noun clauses. They may be used in various noun constructions: (1) as object of some verb of asking or the like, (2) as subject, (3) as predicate nominative, (4) as appositive, (5) as object of a preposition.
- The skipper asked what had become of the cook. [Object.]
- He was asked what his profession was. [Retained object after the passive ([§§ 253], [389]).]
- How we could escape was a difficult question. [Subject.]
- The problem was how they should find food. [Predicate nominative.]
- The question who was to blame has never been settled. [Apposition with question.]
- They all felt great perplexity as to what they should do. [Object of a preposition.]
An indirect question may be an adverbial clause.
- They were uncertain what course they should take. [The clause modifies uncertain.]
- Edmund was in doubt where he should spend the night. [The clause modifies the adjective phrase in doubt.]
444. Since the pronouns who, which, and what may be either interrogative or relative, an indirect question may closely resemble a relative clause. These two constructions, however, are sharply distinguished. A relative clause always asserts something. An indirect question, on the contrary, has an interrogative sense which may be seen by turning the question into the direct form.
The sailor who saved the child is a Portuguese. [The clause who saved the child is a relative clause, for it makes a distinct assertion about the sailor,—namely, that he saved the child. Who is a relative pronoun and sailor is its antecedent.]
{I asked | I do not know | It is still a question | It is doubtful} who saved the child.
[Here the clause who saved the child makes no assertion. On the contrary, it expresses a question which may easily be put in a direct form with an interrogation point: “Who saved the child?” Who is an interrogative pronoun. It has no antecedent.]