The Girls of Cropton Hall

by Stanlegh Meresith

  She felt the hot shock of the impact a split second before she heard its loud report, but the two so close together doubled the surprise and pain. She cried out a high-pitched "OOOOW!" and very nearly reached back to clutch her fierily stinging bottom but stopped herself, knowing this was not allowed. She wanted to be brave, to earn respect, but, OUCH! it was hard. And the second loud SMACK, which flattened her right buttock and rocked her forward again, didn't make it any easier. Her rear felt like a furnace of stings. Her face was scrunched up and tears had come to her eyes. Two. She was just beginning to hope that that would be her lot when the third one slapped forcefully into her left cheek, catching her partly where the first swat had landed.

  "Yeoow!" she cried. Her knees were wobbling now and the tears had burst their banks and were rolling down her cheeks. She held on to the bench but she couldn't stop her knees from bending and stretching, lifting her bottom up and down to try to ease the hellish stinging. A wave of fear swept through her at the thought of another whack. No, that was enough. It hurt too much now. Please, it wouldn't be right, I'm only a girl...

  "AARGHH!" Pain flooded her mind as this one cracked into her right buttock. Again it overlapped the earlier one and Charlotte's head reared up, her face a strangled grimace, before she let out a series of moans. She had to do something...

  "Please miss," she begged in a desperate, frightened voice, "please ... no more ... it's too much!" And then her head collapsed between her arms again as she fought to overcome the agonising stinging.

  "By no means too much, young lady," she heard a distant voice say. "But it will suffice for now. Get up and compose yourself, Wilson."

  Relief, and a little shame, swept through Charlotte as she slowly unbent her torso and felt her behind. It was exceedingly hot but holding it helped stem the stinging a little. She wished she hadn't begged. The others had heard and might tell everyone she was a weakling, a cry-baby. She reached down to pull up her panties and winced as they fitted into place over her swollen bottom.

  "Chop! Chop! Wilson, we haven't got all day. I think you've made enough of a fuss already." Charlotte's shame rose stronger and she couldn't help burst out, fresh tears springing from her eyes,

  "I'm sorry, Miss, I'm sorry for begging. I didn't mean to, Miss, it's just that it was ... it hurt so much, Miss, and I-"

  Miss Bainbridge regarded her with surprise and some amusement for several seconds. Then, patting her on the shoulder, she said,

  "Wilson, it's over now. You took your punishment quite bravely and you've nothing to be ashamed of. I've seen girls make a lot more of a fuss than that in my time so don't you worry. Now go and join the others." Grateful, Charlotte stepped tentatively back to the line of fellow pupils, wiping her cheeks as she went.

  "Turn round girls," ordered the Deputy Head. Once she had the attention of the four flushed and tear-stained faces, Edith addressed them gently.

  "Now I know you are all sore, and feeling sorry for yourselves, but I urge you to dwell on the reasons why and learn, girls, learn from this so you won't find yourselves bending over again soon. I don't think the current generation of Cropton Hall girls have quite realised yet that punishment for foolishness, or worse, will be swift and painful. In case you hadn't noticed, it's not the same as last year. The only lines to be written round here now, girls, will be on your bottoms, with a cane! Now, run along with you - back to your prep tasks, and make sure you do them thoroughly."

  Thus dismissed, the four girls turned and filed out of the changing-room, heads bowed, bottoms burning and minds pondering gravely the implications of Miss Bainbridge's words.

  9. The Turning of the Worm

  Margaret had thought about it a lot, driven by a desire to understand what she saw as her strangeness. After all, what right-minded person actually smacks themselves, hard, on the bottom? Repeatedly! And gets sexual pleasure from it? These, for Miss Margaret Dawson, were the questions that had quietly worried her for years, for she liked to think of herself as right-minded, and moral, and good.

  She'd first experimented when she was about ten, smacking herself lightly with her hairbrush - both sides of it - right-handed. At first she'd liked the bristles best, but the sharper pain of the wooden back took over as her greed for pain grew. And then Miss Hardacre had given her the butter-pat. Had she known? Could she have guessed?

  Some exploration of texts on psychology led her to believe that her urge for punishment and pain had derived from a very early spanking from her father, due (she was told later) to her having, in a tantrum, kicked her mother quite painfully. It was as if she was somehow still atoning for the guilt of hurting her mother, repeating that original spanking.

  Whatever the case, this was part of her life and she knew she couldn't live without it. She was forty-one and, as her shyness grew less crippling, and her knowledge of the world broader, she started to consider the possibility that she might dare to live out her fantasy of punishment with another person. Actually doing the daring, of course, was another matter. To whom could she possibly reveal this most embarrassing and peculiar of secrets?

  Whacking the three girls the night before had, she could acknowledge, excited her, but she was confident in her ability to separate her professional from her personal life. She agreed completely with Verily's emphasis on fairness and moderation. Anyway, her excitement had been more about imagining herself bent over the sofa than about the pain she was causing the girls - which they thoroughly deserved!

  She sighed and turned back to the tests she was marking.

  ---oOo---

  Cropton Hall

  September 7th

  Dear Jack

  How are you? How's school? Been in any trouble? I miss you a lot, and right now I'm feeling kind of blue (well, more of a stripy red, I suppose!) and I need to try and write it out to you. Somehow I don't think you're going to mind. In fact, I'm pretty sure what I'm about to tell you is going to get Mr JT standing to so much attention you'll split your trousers!! Don't think I didn't notice how your eyes popped out that day in Hampstead when I was telling you about those beatings when I was a fourth-former. And the way you'd squeeze my bum all the time when we were making love? Dirty old man, you.

  Term began three days ago and we've got a new Headmistress and it's a totally different Cropton Hell. And it's not like Hell as in boring any more, more like hell as in HOT.

  I got caned. First time in over two years, since Old Boot Dunstan left. And OUCH! I'd forgotten how much it hurts. So, for your delectation, my sweet love, I shall tell you all about it and you can read it over and over and do what you have to do, till Christmas when (please God) we can see each other again and you can squeeze this bum again (and hopefully I won't mind then - right now, just sitting down is agony). I shall try to describe as much as I can so you'd better bloody appreciate it all right?

  Thanks to a certain someone taking up so much of my time over the summer, I never did the History work we were set, and in today's first lesson, of course, there was a test. If I'd got nought, which I would have, I would never have heard the end of it and Gibbo (History teacher and professional sadist if you ask me) would've been watching over me for months. So I cheated - I borrowed Gabrielle's notes. But, typical, I wasn't careful enough and Gibbo was unusually eagle-eyed (probably fresh cos it's the start of the year).

  "Miss Bennett!" she exclaimed. "You're cheating!" As if this was something outrageously unheard of. Her shock was almost funny, except she sent me out, saying I'd be reported to Miss Markham (she's the new Head who's brought back the cane and several other painful looking things - they're hanging in the classrooms, can you believe?). Luckily Gibbo thought the notes were mine (notes? I hadn't even made any notes) so Gabrielle was in the clear. Or so I thought (that's the bad part of this story).

  So, after History, I was pretty sure I was in for the cane, just not sure when, which is really depressing and nerve-wracking. You can't help thinking about it. Well, you know what I mean, Jack, you've been there. But
did you ever feel your bottom actually tingling just thinking about it? Mine did that, almost as if it's got its own brain or something.

  7.10 p.m. I'm doing some of the History work I should've done over the summer when my worst nightmare appears at the door of our classroom. This is a short-sighted, narrow-minded specimen of hypocritical wormness called Patterson who, in a stroke of whatever the opposite of genius is, was chosen as Head Girl for this year. Ugh! She's a mousy, vindictive coward and I really, really, no seriously, hate her. Though I shouldn't, I know Jack ... love makes the world go round, right?

  "Bennett - the Headmistress wants to see you in her study. You're to come with me," says The Worm in front of everyone in Upper Sixth A, which is somewhat embarrassing to start with. But what got me most was the obvious pleasure on her ugly face!! She didn't even try to hide it!! Really, Jack, what happened to honour among thieves, a bit of loyalty or even just sympathy for your fellow pupils? She's a Quisling is what she is, like in the war.

  I followed her stupid frumpy back to Miss Waring's form room. It seemed this was to be a round-up: lambs to the slaughter. The Worm did her oh-so-serious 'Linton, the Headmistress wants to see you' routine again. If only she knew how pompous and stupid she looked. Trouble was her words were having a powerful effect which was only encouraging her (and making her cream her knickers, I bet) - I could see how everyone looked up anxiously and went a bit pale (except French and Thomas in Linton's class who just raised their eyebrows and gave me a sympathetic smile). I didn't know what she'd done but poor Penny Linton looked like she wanted to die. After we'd collected Pringle from 5B and a new girl called Simpson, The Worm led us down the corridor towards the Head's study... that fateful walk of doom I know so well! She stopped half way and told us she'd been given strict instructions - how we had to sit on the bench and not talk - and how she'd report us to Miss Markham if we disobeyed. Ugh! How I hate officious, bossy prigs.

  The bench outside Miss Markham's study is ridiculously low, probably deliberate, so if you're quite tall like me you end up with your knees almost under your chin and you feel pretty small. The Worm knocked and waited and after a bit Miss Markham opened the door.

  I have to tell you about Miss Markham a bit first. She's pretty strange. She's got these eyes, they're very piercing and sort of hypnotise you, and that's very scary when she's not pleased but there are these moments when they're really warm and make you feel like you want to be friends with her (I know, pinch me!). And it's not just the eyes. She's not quite like any of the Heads I've met before. She doesn't just trot out that old "How dare you" line and make you feel like a cockroach. She's more thoughtful, as if she does actually want to understand you. Anyway, you'll see.

  So Miss Markham stands there and eyes us one by one with the not pleased look and, I tell you, even I cringed. Linton actually started to cry! Then she turned and went back inside telling The Worm to 'send in the first girl'.

  Pringle, the fifth former in the Countess' class, is first on the list and the door closes behind her. Me and Simpson exchange a look - she seems like quite a plucky girl, gives me a rueful smile, as if to say 'here we go again' - she must have been to a strict prep school. The Worm gives us a look to say 'Smiling ist verboten, jawohl!'

  After about a minute we hear a loud smack and Linton gasps and starts to shake with sobs, poor thing. I go to put my hand on her arm and The Worm, in her wormiest impression of a concentration camp Kommandant, tells me to stay where I am. Really, Jack, I thought it was us who won the war?

  Three more rather frightening loud smacks follow and then we hear footsteps and the door opens and there's Pringle looking very pained with her hands on her bum. Off she goes, walking a bit like Charlie Chaplin, and we sit and wait. Who's next, we're all wondering? The Worm's got a list but she's clutching it to her flat chest as if it's got the plans for the V2 rocket on it.

  Eventually we hear the Head call out, "Next girl" and The Worm taps Linton on the shoulder. Me and Simpson exchange another look. Linton's looking at her shoes and gets up very reluctantly and goes in. We hear a "Shut the door behind you, Linton," and the last glimpse is of her terrified face looking down at her hand on the doorknob.

  Linton got four with what sounded like a strap - the smacks weren't quite as loud as the hairbrush Pringle had obviously been whacked with, but they had a deeper kind of sound. And, oh my God, did she scream! After each one, piercing yells came through the door, and weeping and wailing! When she came out, also clutching her bum, she looked like she'd been ten rounds with a ghost, wide-eyed with shock, sort of pale and flushed at the same time. It was comical, and of course a bit sad. Simpson had to look down and hide her giggles. I asked Linton later and she said it was her first time ever being 'spanked' (her word) and that her bottom had always been so sensitive, and she just knew it was going to be absolutely terrible. "And was it?" I asked her. She said that actually it wasn't as bad as she thought; she'd just been so scared. A lesson there somewhere, I suppose, dear Jack. How are you doing? How's Mr JT? Main course still to come, young man, so don't pig out on the starters.

  So, off trots Screamer Linton and there's just me and this plucky Simpson who's sobered up a lot now, and is playing nervously with her hair. I'm intrigued as to why she's there, what she's done, but The Worm stands guard, watching us like Death, so I daren't ask. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be last, and after about two long, long minutes we hear, "Next girl," again, and - I still can't believe this, it just boggles my mind - The Worm looks at the list, and she waits, and she waits some more, and then she looks at me, and she looks at Simpson, and she's got this sadistic little grin at the corners of her nazi mouth. I tell you, I felt so angry I just wanted to leap at her throat and bite through her juggler vein. Eventually, Miss Markham calls out, "Patterson," and she jumps and gives Simpson a nudge.

  So I'm left with The Worm. The Worm and me. I can tell she's dying to make some cutting remark about how much I'm going to be hurting soon, or how I deserve it, but she's too scared to talk because that would be breaking the sacred bloody rules.

  Simpson, we soon discover, is getting the cane. On her first day! Seems pretty harsh and even The Worm looks a little startled when we hear that tell-tale swishing and the high, thin sound as it hits. But not a sound from plucky Simpson. I'd guessed she'd be a grin and bear it silent type. I send her my prayers, hoping she can stick it without crying out, and she does! Three strokes, and they sound quite serious, and then she's opening the door. She's very red in the face and there's a tear or two but, bless her, she tries to give me an encouraging smile and I feel a wave of sympathy and admiration for her, even though my heart's beginning to race with my own fear.

  After Simpson hobbles off down the corridor, The Worm and I wait awkwardly. I'm already standing up and straightening my clothes and wishing she (the Head) wouldn't do this whole waiting thing. But of course she does, and it's at least another two minutes before she appears at the door and says,

  "Thank you, Patterson. Apart from the delay in sending in Simpson..." She gives her a quizzical look. "...you've fulfilled your role expertly. You may return to your form room for prep, and I will see you tomorrow, if it proves necessary." She turns then and goes back into the study, calling, "Come this way, Miss Bennett." The Worm just stands there and I can see, I can just tell, that she's desperate to stick around and listen to me getting it. I make a sort of 'Huh' sound to express my contempt and push past her into the study.

  "Shut the door, Bennett," says Miss Markham, and The Worm's still standing there, frozen in indecision, as I close it.

  That's when I decide to take a chance. The Head's just rounding her desk to sit down when I walk forward with determination and say,

  "Miss, I know I'm going to be caned, and that's fair enough, but can I say something first?"

  She stops in her tracks and gives me a very disapproving look. I nearly quail and look away and back off but the thought of The Worm makes me strong. After several seconds of drilling me with t
hose eyes, she says,

  "Very well, Bennett. What is it?"

  "Miss, I bet you anything that Patterson is still standing outside that door. And, Miss..." I add quickly, before she can explode, which is what I'm expecting, "...that delay? She did it deliberately, Miss. She just looked at us and wouldn't say who was next. It was ... really cruel, Miss." I'd said it all. It was sneaking, I knew, but who was the one who'd been sneaking on others for years?

  I've no idea how the Head's going to react. She stares at me, her eyes narrow, and she asks in a quiet voice,

  "I see. And why would Patterson do these things?"

  "Because she hates me, Miss, and she wants to hear me getting caned."

  "And you bet me anything, do you Bennett? Very well. If you are willing to receive double your punishment - that is twelve strokes of the senior cane," (she emphasises the words 'twelve' and 'senior'), "then I will test your theory immediately."

  Without thinking, I say, "Yes, Miss, I'm willing." It was a gamble, but you know what, Jack, I just knew I was right! I knew the Worm wouldn't be able to resist the temptation! Miss Markham strides quickly to the door, throws it open and there's a pause. A horrible, long pause. I'm sweating. Then she says,

  "Patterson! What do you think you're doing here? I thought I told you to return to your form room?"

  Yes! I bloody got her!

  There's no sound from Patterson, she's obviously speechless.

  "Well, girl?" asks the Head, getting quite angry. I hear a sort of bleeting 'Sorry' and then Miss Markham says,

  "You will wait out here and we will discuss this in a few minutes. But you can rest assured that I am extremely displeased. Now sit down on the bench." I hear a kind of frightened squeak, then the Head shuts the door, comes back over to her desk and sits. She looks down and seems very thoughtful. I stand there trying to wipe all signs of triumph from my face. She looks up at me for a long moment, like she's searching my eyes.