BEXHILL SCHOOL

It was even worse than I had expected. They'd told me that a caning involved a whole ritual, but I couldn't believe it was that much worse than a spanking.

Old 'Three Taps', the Headmaster, had called me in to his study several times before, so I wasn't exactly a 'newbie' to corporal punishment.

There was that first time, only a few weeks after I'd arrived at the school, when I was reported for being rowdy in a corridor when some potential parents were visiting the school. They hadn't signed up and 'Three Taps' seemed to think I'd given them a poor impression. It cost me the ritual first spanking: lying over his desk for six of the best over the panties with 'Stinger', the horrible, heavy wooden hairbrush he keeps in a drawer. That had me yelping and dancing around.

The next time was a couple of terms later when two of us were caught bunking off from chapel one Sunday. We each got half-a-dozen on the bare with the tawse. I managed it a bit better than poor Julie: she got two extra for getting up before she was told.

Then last term three of us were having a water-fight in the showers. I suppose we were making rather a noise, but nothing like as much as we did when 'Three Taps' had us bending over the back of his sofa and he gave us each six with the paddle. Wow! That hurt, and you should have seen the 'trademarks' afterwards! They lasted for a week.

But all that was small beer compared with this. I guess it was stupid to risk  an illicit visit to the 'Blue Moon' to buy supplies for a midnight feast in the dorm. We'd drawn lots for who was to go, and of course muggins lost. Anyway, there I was, just picking up some bags of crisps when in walks you-know-who. He marched me straight back to the school and made me wait in the secretary's office. The anticipation was awful: I knew the penalty for being caught out of bounds was always 12 with a Senior cane (some girls even got it with a Dragon).

At last I was called in. Just as they said, he'd pulled back the carpet and there was the famous white square on the floor.

"You know what to expect," he said curtly. "Knickers down, bend over and grasp your ankles. If you move out of the square, you get extras." I did as I was told, although my stomach was full of fluttering butterflies. Then I felt the legendary three taps of the cane on my backside. I tried to tense up, but nothing could have prepared me for the fiery sting of that first stroke. Yikes!! I couldn't help it: I reached up and clutched at my poor, blazing cheeks.

"Get down!" he ordered curtly. "That one doesn't count."