Chapter 2
Joan was made a prefect of Wetherby College at the beginning of her last term there, two months before her nineteenth birthday.
She had grown into a creature of superlative loviness, with the sort of beauty that nature, in her wisdom, permits woman to possess but very rarely. She was loved by all — fellow-students, mistresses, masters, servants — not only because of her exceptional beauty but also because of her character, her gentleness of manner, her sympathy to a fellow-human in trouble, her ready wit, her bubbling humor, and her great charm.
Her years at Wetherby had been very happy on the whole. She had suffered a good deal in her first few terms, as she had expected to suffer, because Wetherby had the reputation of being tough with its girls. It was the sister school of Lansdown College, whose boys traditionally went through a planned and systematic period, in their first few terms, of ill-treatment and beating — euphemistically called ragging — which was supposed to be good for the development and training of their character. Upon its foundation, two centuries ago, Wetherby's first Head-mistress had been a woman who took a pride in proving that her girls could endure just as much as the boys of Lansdown. And tradition had carried it on.
None of the ill-treatment and beating at Wetherby came from the teaching staff. They were there only to teach. The administration, the day-to-day running of the school, and particularly the installing of the spirit of discipline, were matters left in the hands of the twelve prefects. These twelve girls, all seventeen or eighteen years of age, held a great deal of power over three hundred girls. And their power sprang principally from their traditional right to use the cane whenever they thought fit. There was very little sadism, very little caning for pleasure. There was, however, no sentimental feeling that the buttocks of a girl were any more inviolate than those of a boy. Why should there be? was the unspoken question at Wetherby. A girl, a woman, is destined by nature to endure a great amount of pain. Look at the agony of childbirth, if nothing else. In comparison, what were a few strokes of a cane across the buttocks? If a boy could stand them, a girl could stand them five times over.
Tradition now, however, was not quite so implacable as it had been in the days of the first Head-mistress. Then, a girl who was to be punished was beaten willy-nilly. She had no choice. And often she was beaten with a whip or a birch, and sometimes, on rare occasions, with a cat-o'-nine-tails. Now, only a cane was ever used. And, in addition, she had a choice. She was offered the choice of writing a few pages of Greek or Latin, or receiving twelve strokes of the cane across her open hands — six across the right and six across the left, or bending over a chair and receiving six strokes across her buttocks. Most girls chose the six across the buttocks. Very few ever chose the writing of the passage of Greek or Latin. There was a great loss of face entailed. Courage had to be shown at all times. Some, from time to time, chose the twelve across the hands, but this was more from reasons of menstruation than of modesty. At other times the buttocks were preferred. For, though the strokes across the buttocks were undoubtedly given with greater force, there were only six — and the pain was over more quickly. Whether a girl was caned upon her naked buttocks or through her knickers was a matter that was left up to the individual prefect. The majority of prefects insisted, however, upon naked buttocks, principally because of tradition. They had themselves been caned upon their naked flesh. Why should it occur to them, when they were elevated to the goddess-like status of prefectship, to do anything but insist upon the removal of the knickers?
Joan had been caned upon her naked buttocks many times in her early days at Wetherby She had been a natural rebel against discipline in her fourteenth year, and had consequently been a frequent visitor to the Prefects' Block for punishment. She had duly removed her knickers, bent over the chair, and received the six lashes of the supple cane with gritted teeth but never a murmur. She had, instead, projected herself into the future. One day, she would be a prefect herself, and she would get her revenge. For the time being, she had been content to wait.
When she returned to Wetherby at the beginning of her last term and read, on the notice board, that she had been made a prefect, she nodded her head slowly and thoughtfully. She decided to go straight into the town to buy something she needed. Automatically, she started towards the Prefects' Block to ask for permission and then, with a feeling of deep satisfaction, realized that now, as a prefect herself, she was free to go into the town whenever she wanted without a prefect's permission. In future, she herself would be giving these permissions.
She left the school grounds and walked the half-mile into the town. She went straight to a hardware shop she knew of.
"I want some canes," she said.
The shopkeeper was a man of about forty. In spite of many years' experience of the prefects of Wetherby he had never become quite accustomed to the visits to his shop, at the beginning of every term, of two or three young women wanting to buy canes. He continued to find it a little shocking.
He looked at Joan without surprise, nevertheless. "The female of the species," he muttered. "Canes again!"
Joan laughed. "Yes, I've been told you always say that when a prefect comes to buy a cane. Can you finish it?"
"Finish it?" He looked at her blankly. "Finish the last half?"
He frowned at her. "I dunno what you're talking about."
"Let it pass," said Joan. "Will you show me your canes, please?"
He brought her a tall vase filled with canes of different lengths and thicknesses. They all had U-shaped handles.
With great care she selected four very thin and supple ones. "These, please."
"You think they'll be enough?" he asked sarcastically. "You won't break 'em?"
Joan felt suddenly that she would like to break them all over his own backside. She drew a breath and said calmly: "How much, please?"
"A bob."
She gave him a shilling. "Thank you."
"D'you want 'em wrapped?"
"No, thank you. It's not necessary to wrap them."
"Enjoy yourself," he said sourly, as she left the shop.
Momentarily, his manner upset her. She had come with such high spirits to buy the canes. It was, after all her turn. She had been caned unmercifully herself. Now her time had come to do some caning of her own. It was, after all, tradition — and justice. She shrugged her shoulders impatiently and put the shopkeeper out of her mind. Her heart began to beat a little more quickly as she looked at the instruments in her hand. Yes, indeed, she thought to herself, there is a good deal of justice in tradition.
She walked back to the school, swinging one of the canes in her right hand and holding the other three in her left. A few townspeople eyed her curiously as she passed them. Not everybody knew Wetherby's reputation. It was exclusively a boarding-school, and took no girls from the town. The townspeople now wondered what this lovely girl could be doing with a number of canes in her hands.
She was wondering how soon someone would do something wrong, and give her her chance. She hoped it would be soon. In any case, she could find a chance when bedtime came. There was always someone who persisted in talking after the silence bell had rung. She would patrol the dormitories and seek her chance.
She felt suddenly a little shocked at the strength of her desire to use a cane. With honesty, she admitted to herself that it was not simply to get revenge. It was something else, something that burned inside her. She wanted to see a pair of naked buttocks stretched tightly over a chair. She wanted to hear the swish of the cane as it descended in her own hands. She had listened to that swish often enough when the cane was in someone else's. She wanted to see the weals spring to life across those naked buttocks. She wanted to hit hard. She felt that, if she did this, something of the burn inside her would be assuaged. The years of waiting would be compensated. She would be fulfilled in some way. It did not occur to her that these feelings were sexual. She had vaguely heard of sadism, of sexual flagellation, but she had never related it to herself. To her, the matter was simple, if a little shocking at this moment. Prefects had the right to use a cane, and many prefects enjoyed doing so. She was now a prefect, and she was going to enjoy doing so, too.
Her chance came sooner than she had expected. As she crossed a field and came up to a still, her way was barred by a farmer's boy, about seventeen years old. He was sitting on the top of the stile.
"Will you let me pass, please," said Joan.
The boy grinned and shook his head. "Not unless you give us a kiss."
She did not hesitate. She dropped the canes and advanced on him. He made no move. He did not know that the girls of Wetherby were trained in Judo. To his great surprise he found himself, within three seconds, flat on his face on the ground. In a flash Joan reached for one of the canes. She put a foot heavily on the back of his neck and pinioned him to the earth. She lifted the cane and lashed him hard across his backside and legs. She lashed him six times and then removed her foot. She picked up her other canes and crossed the stile. She was panting a little but she said nothing.
The boy said nothing either. He was too surprised to speak. With the pain of the lashes burning like fire, he lay where he was, only turning his head to look incredulously at her as she walked away on the other side of the stile. He still did not quite understand what had happened to him.
Joan was tingling all over. Her heart was racing and there was that old feeling of breathlessness in her throat. It was the first time she had ever hit anyone with anything more than her hand, and she had found it a very exciting thing. Each time she had struck at his body she had received something like a sweet electric shock. It suddenly occurred to her that she could have given him more than six. He had been quite helpless under her foot, at least for a few more moments. She might have given him twelve, or even twenty. That would really have shown him something ! She had automatically stopped on the sixth stroke because she had become accustomed to the idea that caning went in sixes. At Wetherby, at any rate, more than six were never given at any one time.
She stopped and looked back. The boy was standing at the stile watching her with an open mouth. She considered returning and putting him down on his face again. He would probably run for life if he saw her coming towards him again but she was sure that she could overtake him.
She changed her mind as she heard the school bell in the distance. Lunch-time. She was hungry. She waved her canes at the boy, turned, and walked quickly in the direction of the school.
For about a year now she had had the privilege of having a study, but it had been a study shared with another girl. Now that she was a prefect she had one to herself. After lunch she went to it, closed the door and surveyed it again.
It was a room about fifteen feet long by twelve wide. Its window, an attractive bay, faced the door. A small upright fireplace was in the left-hand wall. Two water-colours, left by its previous occupant, hung on each side of the fireplace. There was a threadbare carpet on the floor, a deep easy-chair, a writing-table standing by the ink and milk and tea and butter of generations of girls, an upright chair, a cupboard for a variety of things from a mackintosh to a hockey stick, a gas-ring and blackened kettle on the hearth, and nothing else.
Joan decided that she would have to do something about it. She would be at Wetherby for only three months more but, nevertheless, the study needed some careful doing-up. She would have to get some new furniture, too.
She looked at the water-colours beside the fireplace. An idea came to her mind. She took them off their hooks and put them on the stained table. She took her four canes out of the cupboard. She hung one on each of the empty hooks, and stood back to survey the effect. It pleased her. They were a more positive decoration than the four rather inspired water-colors. It gave her a feeling of warm pleasure to see them hanging there promisingly before the fireplace.
There was a tap at the door.
"Come in," called Joan.
A girl of the Lower Fifth came into the study. She was about fifteen years old. "Excuse me, Lyveden. I've a message for you from the Head." Her eyes fell on the four canes beside the fireplace. She faltered.
"Yes?" said Joan kindly. "Go on."
"There's a meeting of prefects in her study at five o'clock."
"Thank you."
The girl threw another quick glance at the canes and disappeared.
Joan laughed softly to herself. She looked at the canes. They did look rather threatening. Perhaps she had better take them down and put the water-colors back. She would see. They could stay there for the time being, anyway.
The Headmistress sat at her desk and studied the faces of the twelve prefects ranged in a semi-circle before her. Five of them had just been appointed. The other seven already had a term of two of experience. She began to speak, looking more at the new five than at the others.
"You are now in a position of considerable authority," she said. "Prefects here, as you know, have a great responsibility. The running of the school is largely in your hands. So is discipline. And you have a great deal of power. This is largely because you are free to use the cane whenever you think fit. I sometimes wonder whether this tradition is a good one or not. It is, however, a tradition — and a strong one. As long as the boys at Lansdown can be beaten by the prefects there, we at Wetherby shall probably allow our girls to be caned by our own prefects. It is supposed to be good for character. If it is, there are two sides to it. It may be good for the character of the girl who is caned. It is also good for the character-building of the one who does the caning. She must learn to punish justly, objectively, and dispassionately."
She paused and looked into the eyes of the five new prefects. "Justly, objectively, and dispassionately," she repeated. "Never in anger."
She paused again. "It goes without saying — or, at any rate, it ought to go without saying — that no prefect must ever allow herself to experience the least pleasure while punishing a girl. That is why you must never punish anyone while you are feeling angry. If you are angry there is a danger that you may feel some satisfaction in inflicting the punishment, and that is a very bad thing." She frowned to herself and on grimly. "Sometimes we make mistakes in the appointment of prefects. Sometimes —not very often, I'm glad to say, but sometimes — there have been caning for its own sake."
Joan thought of the four canes hanging on the wall of her study. She felt herself on the verge of a blush. She fought it down. The Headmistress might see through her at once. She forced herself to put something of shocked incredulity into her expression.
"There have been two cases of such prefects in my own time," the Headmistress went on darkly, "and they didn't last long. One was reduced to the ranks, as it were. The other was expelled. That one was a very bad case indeed. A shocking case."
Was she like me? Joan wondered. And am I so shocking? Is it really so shocking to want to cane someone? I never complained when they caned me. Why is it so wrong for me to want to do it now?
" ... care is taken over the appointment of prefects," the Headmistress was saying. She smiled at them all. Her grim tone had gone. "And all of you have been very carefully selected. I am confident that you will all be highly worthy of your responsibility." She looked down at her desk and moved some papers. The interview was at an end.
"Good luck in your administration of the school. And a very happy term to you."
Joan went back to her study quickly and took the canes down from their hooks. She put them in the cupboard again. It was a pity, she thought. They had been such a delightfully positive decoration. She had been very unwise, though, to put them there at all. She had allowed her enthusiasm to carry her away.
Fortunately, no harm had been done. No one had seen them.
Suddenly she said: "Oh damn!" She had remembered the girl from the Lower Fifth who had come with the summons from the Headmistress. That girl had seen them. And she probably told a good many other girls about them. The fact that a newly-appointed prefect hung her canes on the wall would be news indeed.
It had been extremely unwise. But nothing could be done now. It was too late. From now on she would simply have to be very careful. The Headmistress might be a battle-axe, but she seemed to have a perceptive brain. She would very easily spot a prefect who was burning to use the cane for its own sake. And that prefect would not last long. She had made that quite clear.
Thoughtful, Joan hung the four water-colors back on their hooks.
At this moment, the girl from the Lower Fifth was saying: "But I tell you it's true! She has two of them on each side of her fireplace. Honestly."
"Joan Lyveden! Never!" said another fifteen-year old girl. "Lyveden hasn't got that sort of character. You must've been dreaming. Or you must've seen them in somebody else's study. How many studies did you go into?"
"All the twelve."
"You see. You mixed it up. Lyveden couldn't possibly be that sort of brute. She's too sweet a girl. She'd never harm a fly."
Another girl stood up. "There's one way to settle this. I'll go and see. What can I go to her for, though?"
"Ask permission to go into the town tomorrow."
"Yes, that's a good idea. But what for?"
"Oh Christ! You want to register a letter or send a telegram or something."
"All right." The girl left the common-room. The other girls fell silent, reading magazines or looking out of the window. They all hoped that their estimation of Joan Lyveden's character had not been wrong. She was an idol for them all. After about ten minutes the girl came back. "On either side of her fireplace there are pictures," she said, looking contemptuously at the girl who had brought them the worrying report. "It must've been someone else's study."
There was a sigh of relief all round the room.
"Never mind," said someone charitably. "We all make mistakes, don't we? At any rate, we were right about Lyveden, and that's the thing that matters."
"Yes, it is," said someone else. "But I wonder who it is who's got the four canes on her walls."
"We'll find that out soon enough. Anyway, it's not Lyveden."
"It couldn't have been. She's not like that."
The idol was still safely on her pedestal.
Joan was extremely careful. Not only did she not prowl the dormitories that first night in search of a victim, as she had planned, but she let six days go by before she gave her first caning. By then she was in a state of considerable frustration. She was honest enough to see the amorality of her desire to beat someone for the sake of the pleasure it would give her, but, on the other hand, she was still enough of a schoolgirl, steeped in tradition, to feel that it was unfair for her to have to wait so long. When the cane had cut into her own buttocks so many times during these last years, she had fortified her courage and her endurance with the knowledge that, if she were ever to be made a prefect, her own time would come. And now she was a prefect, but she could not freely do as she wanted. It was extremely frustrating.
On the fifth day, however, she found what she considered was a highly reasonable case for a caning. A girl from the Upper Fourth unsuccessfully tried to throw a cigarette into her chamber pot as Joan passed through the dormitory shortly before lights-out.
Smoking was a very serious offence at Wetherby. An offender was invariably punished publicly with a caning in front of the whole school in the Main Hall after morning chapel. Joan knew this, and knew that she ought to report the matter to higher authorities, so that the public caning should follow according to custom.
She eyed the girl who was lying in a terrified posture in her bed. "You know what I ought to do?" She herself knew she had not the slightest intention of doing it.
"No, Lyveden."
"Yes, you do. You know I ought to report you. And you know what would happen to you then."
The girl sighed. "Yes, I do." She pulled the sheet up as though it would protect her.
Joan looked at her. She was a good-looking girl of nearly fourteen, with a good figure. She would look very appealing with her knickers down, bent over a chair. Her naked buttocks would be delightful to beat with a swishy, supple cane.
"Have you been caught smoking before?"
"Oh, no, Lyveden."
"Truly?"
"Oh, yes, truly." Momentarily, the girl had a hope that she was going to be let off. She lay very still, praying with all her might.
"All right," said Joan, with an uplift of her heart. Her opportunity had come. "Report to me in my study after chapel tomorrow morning." She walked out of the dormitory. If she were reproached for not reporting the matter she could say she had felt lenient.
When she had gone, someone said: "My God, you're lucky it was Lyveden. Any other prefect would have reported you for a public bumming. Good old Lyveden. You'll just get six from her and it'll be over."
Someone else said: "Yes, Lyveden is a good type. She's a kind sort of person. You're very lucky. And she probably won't give you the six very hard. She's too soft-hearted. She may not even cane you all."
The idol was even more securely on her pedestal.
When the girl came to Joan's study after chapel she was rather frightened, in spite of the assurances of her class-mates that she did not have very much to fear. The first few moments convinced her that her class-mates had been wrong.
Joan was sitting in the deep easy-chair. "Go to that cupboard," she said, "and bring me all the canes you find there."
The girl brought the four canes to her. Joan saw that she was trembling. Her own hands began to shake. She clasped them tightly together. At last, at long last, her moment had arrived. "Choose one of them," she said, as calmly as she could.
"Choose one? What do you mean, Lyveden?"
"Don't be stupid girl. What do you think I mean?"
The girl looked quickly at her and decided to stop prevaricating. She examined the canes in her hand and chose the thinnest. "This," she said, and held it out. This one might perhaps be a little less painful than the others.
Joan took it. "Now put that chair — yes, that upright one — in the middle of the room here. Yes, that's right. A little more to the left. Good. Now take down your knickers."
The girl opened her eyes wide. "My knickers, Lyveden?"
"Yes, your knickers. But why are you surprised?"
"Oh — I don't know."
"Tell me."
"Well, the other girls were sure you wouldn't bum anyone — cane anyone, I mean, with knickers off."
Joan chuckled. "They were wrong, weren't they? I used to be caned with my knickers off. Most people are. Why shouldn't you be?" She held the cane in her right hand and drew its length slowly through her left. Her heart was pounding fast. "Come on, now. Take them down." She wanted to see the naked buttocks.
The girl lifted her skirts up over the small of her back and thrust down her knickers. Her buttocks, with their pink-cream flesh, were like small round hills.
Joan caught her breath. She drew the cane through her fingers again and said: "Bend down over the chair." Her heart pounded faster.
The girl did as she was told. Out of the corner of her eye she watched Joan sitting in the easy-chair. Why, she thought, doesn't she get up and get the whole thing over with?
Joan was in no hurry. She gazed at the pink-cream flesh and thought of what it would look like in a little while. There would be six bright red weals across it. "Bend lower," she said. An idea occurred to her. "Push the chair away, after all. Yes, that's right. Now touch your toes."
"I can't touch my toes. I've never been able to."
Joan got up from her chair. "We'll see. Touch them as much as you can, anyway. Otherwise, I might give you more than six."
The girl opened her mouth to say that more than six was not permitted, but thought better of it. She forced her body down and touched her toes with the tips of her fingers.
"Good," said Joan. "Here comes the first." She swung on her heel and brought her cane slashing down across the tightened flesh. A bright red weal sprang into existence at once across the buttocks.
The girl came erect at once with a cry of pain.
"No," said Joan gently, "you must not stand up till I tell you that you can."
The girl bent again. "Plase, please, Lyveden," she gasped. "Pease!"
Joan raised her cane, and then paused. Into her mind had come the memory of a day, years before, when her brother and his friend Robert had lain naked at her feet, tied up hand and foot, and she had pretended to be giving them terrible lashes with a long bamboo cane. She had tied them up herself, and Robert had disgraced himself, in his nakedness, by getting an erection which had certainly been for her. She looked at the naked buttocks of the girl before her, with the livid weal stretching across them. It would be rather nice, she thought, if the buttocks belonged to Robert, and not to this girl. It would be so much better to be caning Robert. Robert who seemed to find me attractive. Robert who got an erection over me when I was going to tie him up. Handsome Robert.
She caught her breath. A sort of mist came over her mind. In the midst of it she found herself aching for it to be Robert who was bent over in front of her. She began to wish for it with a strength that made her a little dizzy. She drew several deep breaths and forced away the dizziness.
When her brain cleared she looked again at the bending girl's naked buttocks. To her great surprise she realized that she had lost a interest in putting her cane across them. "All right," she said dully, "you can pull your knickers up now."
The girl stood erect and looked at her incredulously. "But — you gave me only one!"
"Yes," said Joan mechanically, "and that's all I'm going to give you." She forced a smile. "Unless you really want the other five."
The girl vanished from the study, pulling her knickers into position as she went. "Good old Lyveden!" she breathed, as she flew down the corridor.
Joan sat down again in her deep easy-chair. "I see," she said to herself, thoughtfully. "Well I seem to know something more about myself now. I don't want to cane girls, after all. How very strange that is. I want to cane Robert — or any other boy — or man. But at the moment I want to cane Robert. I want to tie him up all over again, let him get an erection, and thrash him. Well, well! How very, very interesting that is. Why haven't I realized it before?"
She drew the cane through her fingers again. "How shall I be able to do it, though? It needs some careful thought. But I'll do it, sooner or later. Definitely."
The next day she gave away her canes to some of the other prefects. She pretended that they had been left in her cupboard by the previous occupant of her study. When it was necessary for her to beat anyone she borrowed somebody else's cane. In the whole of the rest of the term she caned only three girls.
The burn inside her did not, however, leave her. She now thought constantly of the time that she would have Robert bending down before her, with his buttocks naked, waiting for the lashes of her cane. And the burn grew, and continued to grow, until she felt that she would never be able to get through the rest of the term. She had no idea how she would arrange it, but that did not bother her. As soon as the holidays came she would arrange it somehow. It had become the strongest determination of her life.