Simon Bunyan stopped as he walked past the television room. “Damn,” he muttered, hearing a noise. “When will they learn?” It was the third time this month that the pupils in his House had left the TV on when they’d gone to bed. Irritated, he swung the door open.
It had been his fear, of course. About going co-ed. The school had survived very nicely throughout its long history without needing the presence of girls. And the sight of the two stark naked teenage bodies, quickly disentangling themselves from one another on the sofa, left little doubt as to what he’d interrupted. Bunyan recognised the boy first: Alan Griffiths, one of the brighter of the Lower Sixth, who clutched at a pile of clothes from the floor to cover himself.
And the girl? She was sitting up now on the sofa, her hands desperately trying to protect her modesty, as she looked around frantically for something to cover herself with. An attractive lass, he thought to himself. He struggled to remember her name. Stewart. That was it. Alice Stewart. Daughter, if he remembered correctly, of one of the very school governors who’d made the stupid decision to go co-ed in the first place.
“You two had better get dressed, then follow me up to my office,” he ordered. He turned and left the room, wondering how he was going to play this as walked upstairs to his study. As far as he could tell, there was only one real course of action: expulsion. But grave as their offence doubtless was, expelling a pupil always seemed so harsh. And Alice had only just joined the school. And her father was a Governor.
He glanced at his watch: 10.45pm. Not too late to call the Headmaster? Bunyan sat down behind his desk, and picked up the telephone, dialling the internal number. Four rings, then a booming voice at the other end of the line. “Edwards speaking.”
“Headmaster. Sorry to disturb you at this late hour. Simon Bunyan here.”
“Simon. What can I do for you?”
“Advice, please, Headmaster.”
“Fire away.”
“Well…. I’ve just found two of our pupils having sex with one another, in our television room. Griffiths and Miss Stewart, And I was wondering how to play it: I’m not sure there’s a precedent since we let girls in.”
“Ah. No. They were definitely having sex?”
“Well it certainly seems that way. I walked straight in on them. Thought someone had left the television on again.”
“Oh. And the girl was Miss Stewart, you say? Alice Stewart?”
“Yes, Headmaster.”
“Daughter of…..”
“I know. One of the governors.”
“And a generous benefactor of the school over the years. Drat. And where are they now?”
“I told them to get dressed and make their way up to my office.”
“Right. Well… we’ll have to expel them, I suppose. Although… Matthew Stewart’s daughter? I don’t know, Simon, I really don’t.”
“Should we sleep on it? Decide in the morning?”
“Well we can’t contact the parents at this time of night, can we? Yes, I think you’re right. Tell them they’re in serious trouble. Send them to bed. Then meet me for breakfast at seven, and we can decide on a course of action.”
“Thank you, Headmaster.” A knock at the door. “Sounds like they’re here, so I’d better go.”
“Yes, yes. Indeed. Thank you for thinking to bring this to my attention, Simon. Good night.”
“Good night, Headmaster.” Bunyan put the phone down, and shook his head. He’d keep it brief this evening. Send them to bed.
He spoke, clearly. “Enter!”
It was two very shame-faced, and very scared teenagers who entered his room. Alice had been crying, he noticed. The boy – well, he was trying to look brave. Bunyan gestured to them to stand in front of his desk.
“I suppose you understand the severity of the situation in which you find yourselves?”
“Yes, Sir.” From both of them simultaneously. Alice’s response almost inaudible, biting her lip, staring at the ground.
The practicalities first. “I assume that you were… taking appropriate precautions?”
“Sir?” Alan questioned.
“Condoms, boy.”
“Oh. Er. Yes, sir.”
A loud sniff from Alice, who wiped away a tear.
“Well we can be thankful for small mercies. Now. I have spoken to the Headmaster…” (another sniff from Alice) “and he and I will be meeting in the morning to decide your fate. So I’d ask you to remain in your dormitories in the morning until you are sent for, and not to mention this evening’s events to anyone. Do I make myself clear?”
Alan, keeping the proverbial stiff upper lip: “Yes, Sir.”
Alice nodded, a veritable picture of misery. Softly: “will you tell my father?”
“We’ll decide what disciplinary action we’ll be taking in the morning, young lady. But I can’t rule it out.”
She was crying openly now. Clearly the Headmaster was not the only one in awe of Mr. Stewart.
I shook my head at them wearily. “Go to bed. Straight to bed. And woe betide you if I hear any reports of physical contact between you en route.”
And with that they left, downcast, doubtless to spend a sleepless night pondering what might befall them.
And he went to bed. And slept like a log, until the alarm woke me at 5.45am before his morning run, prior to breakfast with the Headmaster.
—
“Orange juice, Simon?”
“Yes, please, Headmaster.”
They sat at the end of the high table in the oak-panelled school dining room. Empty, at this time of the morning: the pupils wouldn’t start eating for another twenty minutes.
And they discussed the steps to be taken to deal with the miscreants from the previous evening.
The Headmaster spoke first: “I would just expel them, of course. But young Alice’s father… He’s a good friend to the school. And can imagine if the press finds out? Having just taken girls on this term…. With Mr. Stewart having been one of the key advocates for the change? They’d have a field day at our expense.”
“I guess it’s a matter of the precedent that we want to set, Headmaster.”
“Mmm. Yes. It is. But sometimes there are wider considerations to bear in mind.”
“Did you have a plan in mind?”
Edwards paused. “Well… I’m not worried about Griffiths. But I was reflecting on how Mr. Stewart might react if we simply expel his daughter. So I thought we should call the parents and give them the choice.
Bunyan raised his eyebrows quizzically. “The choice between what?”
“Well being a public school, we are still allowed to use corporal punishment. If the parents consent…. which some of them don’t, these days…. So I’d give them the choice – their offspring get thrashed or expelled.”
“I didn’t know we caned the female pupils.”
“Well there’s a first time for everything, old boy. Equal opportunities for all at Bloxworth. No gender discrimination here.”
Bunyan looked surprised. “And it would be the parents’ decision anyway, right?”
“Right. So can you be kind, and make some phone calls for me? Explain what’s gone on. That their randy little offspring can come to me for a caning, or they’re off the premises by the end of the day.”
“Yes, Headmaster.”
“And while you’re about it, bring the pupils up to your room. Let them listen in to your end of both calls. Then tell me what you’ve agreed before the start of assembly.”
“Right. Thank you…. I’ll do that.”
“Good. Let me know what you decide. If you need me to beat them, I’ll do it after assembly.”
“Thank you, Headmaster.”
—
It was a very worried-looking young man, and a very tear-stained young lady who sat opposite Bunyan as he flicked through his phone book. He found Alan’s parents’ number first, and tapped it into the phone. He wondered how the parents would re-act – never mind how the students would feel as they heard their potential fates.
“Mr. Griffiths…. Simon Bunyan, Bloxworth School. Apologies for calling you so early, but I have a rather pressing disciplinary matter regarding Alan that I need to discuss with you…. Well, yes, I’m afraid, I might as well come straight to the point: he was caught having sexual intercourse with one of the female pupils yesterday evening….. Yes, yes, there’s no doubt. I discovered them at it myself…. They have admitted it to me…. Yes, very serious…..”
He glanced up. The boy had his head in his hands.
Bunyan continued: “Now I need to outline the choices regarding how we deal with this……. Indeed, yes, well you will understand the seriousness of this…. Now usually we would simply expel the pupils concerned, but we are prepared to make an exception if you would prefer us to use corporal punishment instead…. Yes, the cane, from the Headmaster…… Well yes, we would need your consent, hence the call….. And it is your decision….”
Alice was crying. Alan sat silently, shaking his head.
A pause. “No?… That’s fine… As I said, we did want to give you the option…. Thank you for that. So I’m afraid I will have to ask you to come and collect Alan as soon as you can get here today, and remove him from Bloxworth School….. I shall ask Mrs. Watson, the Headmaster’s Secretary, to call you to confirm the arrangements….. Eleven o’clock? Fine… Yes, very disappointing….. Fine. Sorry again to be the bearer of bad news… Thank you, Mr. Griffiths…. Goodbye.”
Tearful Alice looked up at her boyfriend, sadly, then stared back down at the floor. He couldn’t tell whether Alan looked relieved or upset. “They are not prepared to let you be caned, Alan, so I am afraid you will have to leave us later today. Now, I need to sort out Alice.”
Another phone call. Similar script. Angrier father.
Different ending. As the conversation wore on, the girl had gone white, and was trembling.
“Well the good news is that you’ll be staying with us, Alice. So I think you understand the bad news.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Any questions?”
Silence.
“Well, then. Alan, go and pack your things. Then go and wait in the library, and do not speak to the other pupils. We will find you when your parents arrive. Alice – go to assembly as usual, then report to the Headmaster’s office immediately afterwards for your punishment.”
And he sent them on their separate ways. Before picking up the phone to the Headmaster…
—
Hymns sung, prayers recited, announcements made. Then Edwards’ voice boomed out over the pupils and staff, finishing morning assembly on a slightly different note to usual: “I have one final announcement. One final, very disappointing announcement.”
The 400 pupils listened intently. “A very disturbing incident took place yesterday evening, involving sexual relations between two of the pupils in the lower sixth form” There was an audible gasp. “I must make it clear to the whole school that I will not tolerate this type of behaviour under any circumstances. Both pupils’ parents have been contacted, and following our discussions with them, one of them, Alan Griffiths, is to be expelled from the school forthwith, and the other, Alice Stewart, is to remain at the school but will be severely punished.”
Every eye on the room was focused on Alice, in amazement. There had been a low gasp when Edwards has uttered the phrase “severely punished”, and most of them knew exactly what was in store for her as a result. She had gone bright red, and looked close to tears as 400 pairs of eyes turned her way.
The Headmaster finished his lecture. “Please let this be a warning to you. Assembly is dismissed. Alice Stewart, follow me to my office.”
—
“Come straight in.”
She followed him into the room, and heard the heavy door shut behind her. She was surprised at the size and luxury of the room – compared to her Housemaster’s study last night, this was amazing, with a comfortable leather suite, bookcases lining the walls, and an imposing desk.
“Sit down.”
She sat, shaking now.
“I’ll come straight to the point. You know why you’re here. Your behaviour last night was a disgrace. And given your father’s role in introducing co-education to this school, you should be doubly-ashamed. Do I make myself clear?”
She nodded.
“I should also make it clear that it is only because of your father’s contribution as a Governor of this school that I considered any option other than expulsion.”
Barely audible: “Yes, sir. Thank you.”
“Your father has agreed to the punishment that you are about to receive. Have you anything you want to say before we begin?”
A feeble voice: “No Sir.” Feebler still: “Please don’t hurt me.”
“Well I’m afraid I probably will, young lady. That’s rather the point of corporal punishment.” He walked over to a cupboard in the corner of the room. Alice watched him withdraw the cane, and gasped: it was so long, so thick-looking, with a horrible curved handle. She’d been trying so hard to be brave, but the sight of him flexing the stick was too much: her bottom lip started to tremble, and she felt a tear run down her cheek.
“This is a most serious offence, young lady, and so I am going to give you eight strokes of the cane.”
She bit her lip in dread, her face white with fear.
“I’d like you to stand up, and turn the chair on which you’re sitting around. And remove your blazer, skirt and underwear.”
“Sir..! Please, no…”
“Pupils in this school have been being caned for two hundred years, young lady, and punishments have always been on the bare.”
“No, sir, please…” This was too awful, too humiliating.
Edwards sounded annoyed now. “You can’t exactly pretend that you’re not used to taking your clothes off after last night, girl. So get a move on, and bend over the back of the chair, or I shall add two further strokes to your tally.”
Shaking her head, she slipped off her blazer, and folded it over the arm of the leather sofa. And she paused, stared into space, then removed her skirt.
And another pause. Longer… and with a sigh, sliding down her knickers, stepping out of them and placing them next to her other clothes, her hands covering her modesty.
Edwards rapped the top of the desk with his cane. “Get over the chair, right over, and hold onto its front legs.” She leaned forward, the wood cold against her skin, stretching out – her mind now racing beyond the concerns about the Headmaster seeing her nakedness, and anticipating what was to come.
She sensed him walk around the desk, behind her. The worst was just about to come. Could it be as bad as she feared? Not even in her lowest moments last night, lying ashamed and restless in her dormitory bed, had she ever imagined that it would come to this. “Legs further apart, young lady, and I want your backside up in the air.” Shaking with fear, she shuffled her feet apart and adjusted her position.
She felt him press the rod against her, touching her skin, measuring its impending path. “Another of our two-hundred year-old traditions, young lady, is that pupils remain in position, in silence, throughout their punishment, and that any breaches of this result in an additional stroke. Do you understand me?”
“Sssssssssssir.”
And the stick drew back from her skin….
<Crack>
…and imprinted its fierce mark across her buttocks, Alice gasping at the force of the blow, then drawing breath as the pain reached out along the line.
Ten seconds. Twenty, maybe. The Headmaster had no intention of hurrying.
<Whip>
A deep breath. Edwards watched as the red weal formed, the girl shaking her head, trying to control the urge to cry out. A nice stroke, that, he thought to himself, pauing, then drawing back the instrument and delivering the third blow, low down. <Thwack>
A low moan. Well, he thought, this was clearly getting through to her. Teaching her a lesson. A well-deserved lesson, at that. Edwards paused once more, letting the pain from the stroke build, then peak, before tapping the cane against her once more.
Measuring the line… carefully… positioning the rod centrally, between the first two marks, now forming clear, raised tramlines against her pale flesh. Feeling her wince….
<Crack> <Crack>
“Owwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.” The girl’s body braced, the two strokes on top of one another, landing within a moment. Edwards watched her fingers clench the chair leg, struggling to hold her body in position. He chose to ignore her cry – she was, after all, taking her punishment bravely, and total silence was, perhaps, too much to expect.
He wondered if she would get through all eight strokes without flinching – realising that the same thought was doubttless crossing her mind, if she was able to think beyond the searing pain.
And now the sixth stroke: heavier, less whippy, pressing hard into her. Another loud gasp. She half lifted up, hands leaving the chair legs, moving backwards – the urge to clasp her buttocks overcoming her, until she snapped back into control.
The Headmaster watched, listening to the girl’s deep, tearful breaths. This was one courageous young woman, he thought to himself: these were hard strokes, very hard, and she was taking them well. He tapped the rod against her, waiting for her to calm herself, to be ready for the next blow.
The seventh was even harder. <THWACK>. A real howl this time, her right hand instinctively reaching back, the lass’s body racked with sobs.
“What did I tell you about flinching, Miss Stewart?”
“Please. Sir. I mean. Please….”
“You have one left, girl. And I intend it to be a hard one. I shall be kind and ignore your reaction to the previous stroke, but you will take this final one in absolute silence, and remain absolutely still. Do you understand?”
“Sir…”
Always a challenge… when one has delivered a truly hard caning… to make sure that the final stroke is even harder. To make it the most memorable.
He stood to one side of the girl for a moment, waiting for her to settle: letting the tension rise. Slowly, he measured the stick across her by-now well wealed buttocks, laying directly it over an existing line: the second, if he remembered correctly, studying the parallel tramlines.
Leaving the stick there. Pressing gently. Raising it high. Holding it aloft. Then whipping her with all of his strength.
<Whhhhhhhhhack>
Then nothing. A strange silence. Alice desperately trying to control her reaction. Silence still. Then a sniff. And then her shoulders started to heave with crying once more.
Edwards walked around the desk, and laid the cane on its surface. “Stay in position, young lady.” And he pressed the intercom buzzer: “Could you come in and take a letter for me, Mrs. Watson?”
“Yes, Headmaster.”
The secretary walked in, trying to avert her gaze from Alice’s tanned backside. She stood next to the desk and took out her shorthand notepad. “Headmaster?”
“Thank you, Mrs. Watson. I’d like a letter sent to Mr. Stewart – Alice’s father. Dear Mr. Stewart, It is my disappointing duty to have to inform you that I have, this morning, administered corporal punishment to your daughter, further to your conversation with her Housemaster. I do hope that the eight strokes of the cane that she has received will teach her a serious lesson about her future conduct at Bloxworth. I am sure that you will also want to discuss her behaviour with her when she returns home at the end of term. Yours etc.”
Alice sobbed loudly. “Please, Sir…”
Edwards continued. “And an announcement for the main school noticeboard. As I explained in this morning’s assembly, A. Griffiths (Lower Sixth Classics) has been expelled following an incident yesterday evening. Miss A. Stewart (Lower Sixth Arts) has been caned in connection with the same incident. I would remind all pupils that any cases involving sexual relationships between students will be dealt with most severely.”
The school secretary looked up at the Headmaster. “Is that all, Mr. Edwards?”
“Yes, thank you. I will sign those at morning break, if you can have them ready for me.”
As Mrs. Watson left, the Headmaster turned his attention back to the punished girl. “Stand up and get dressed.”
Slowly, gingerly, painfully, Alice lifted herself up, and re-clothed herself. Edwards watched her wince as she pulled her knickers over her buttocks, and then stepped back into her skirt – pausing as she dressed only to wipe away the tears that were falling down her face. She slipped on her blazer.
“Turn the chair back around to face my desk, and sit down.”
Wincing, she gently lowered herself onto the chair, half leaning forward to keep the weight off her buttocks.
“It gives me no pleasure to have to flog a student, Miss Stewart. But sometimes, I am left with no option. I hope this has taught you a lesson sufficiently strong that I need never see you in my study again.”
“Yes. Yes, Sir.” Composing herself as much as possible. “Do you… do you have to write to my father? He’ll kill me.”
“I do. I have dealt with you for breaking school rules. I can well imagine that he might also want to have a little discussion about the appropriateness of his younger daughter’s relationship with her boyfriend.”
“Please, Sir…”
“And that discussion is entirely a matter for you and your father. Now, you should be in a German class, shouldn’t you?”
“Sir. Please…”
“I do hope you are not arguing with me, girl.”
Head down. Meek. “No, Sir.”
“Good. You may call into the girls’ washroom and clean your face. And then I expect you in German, within five minutes. Please apologise to Mr. Schmidt for your lateness, but explain that you have been in my study.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Edwards stood up and walked around the desk, beckoning Alice to her feet. She stood in front of him. Gently, he placed his forefinger under her chin, and lifted her tear-stained eyes to his. “And you can be proud of how well you took your caning, Alice. You are a brave young lady.”
He stepped away.
Alice: “Thank you sir.”
Turning, leaving this dreaded room, closing the heavy door behind her. Hands dropping to clutch her behind. Leaning her shoulder against the wall. Bursting into floods of tears.
And then, composing herself before Edwards appeared, she set off unsteadily, back down the corridor, to face the rest of the school…
