auraient le beguin

Question

Why the conditional, auraient, here?  Why not the pluperfect similar to pouvaient?

Accepted Answer

Bonjour Carl,
Here, you cannot have Le Plus-que-Parfait as it is referring to a situation that happened (i.e. a real situation). Here, we're not talking about a concrete situation but a "hypothetical" one (with a hypothetical couple). Therefore, Le Conditionnel is correct.
You could come across examples as this one with Le Présent though. But, in this case, it would refer to "Le Présent de vérité générale" because it's depicting a "real" cliché/stereotype.
I hope this is helpful.
Bonne journée !

Answer

Can you quote the sentence in question, please? Otherwise I have to go back and click through the exercise, looking for what you're asking.

Answer

"deux adolescents qui auraient le béguin pour la première fois"  is the case referred to in above question