A Prefect's Punishment

    Mrs Scott-Blythe burst angrily into the headmistress's
office without knocking.  Jean Taylor looked up in surprise
and then compressed her lips at the sight of the chairman of
the Board of Governors of Evershead Girls' Grammar School
(Mrs Scott-Blythe refused to be known as a 'chairperson'). 
Since her election the elderly former pupil had become rather
a thorn in her flesh.

    "What is it now, Margaret?" she asked.

    Still looking like thunder Mrs Scott-Blythe explained. 
She had been waiting at the bus stop for a 245 that morning
and when the bus pulled up, rather late, a schoolgirl waiting
behind her in the queue had pushed past her to be first
aboard.  Mrs Scott-Blythe noticed that the blue school uniform
jacket which she was wearing bore the distinctive emblem of
Evershead School.

    Once aboard the bus Mrs Scott-Blythe had marched up to the
girl and remonstrated with her.

    "What difference does it make? You're on the bus, aren't
you?" was the response.  But the school governor had continued
to admonish the girl, demanding that she give her her name. 
"I'm going to report you to your headmistress!" she had said.

    The girl had remained silent however.  Finally, having had
quite enough of being stared at by half a bus load of
passengers, she had got up intending to leave the bus at the
next stop.

    "What's your name, girl?" Mrs Scott-Blythe had demanded,
grabbing hold of her by her arm.

    "Shut up you stupid old cow and mind your own business!"
was the indignant answer.

    The outraged Mrs Scott-Blythe had refused to let go and
was still holding onto the girl and demanding to be told her
name when they reached the platform of the bus.  Still trying
to shake herself free the girl had jumped off the bus and
Mrs Scott-Blythe had tumbled off after her.  The girl had
glanced round to check that her tormentor was not badly hurt
and had then made good her escape.

    Mrs Scott-Blythe was, in truth, only slightly grazed, but
the injury to her self-esteem was worse.  Breathing fury she
tidied herself up and, pausing only to have a cup of tea in a
local tea shop to steady her nerves, made her way to Evershead
School.  Now she demanded that Mrs Taylor expel the girl
concerned immediately.

    "Really, Margaret," said the headmistress, trying to calm
the elder lady down, "I know you're upset, and the girl's
behaviour was certainly inexcusable, but this isn't really a
case for expulsion.  And, in any case, I thought you said you
didn't know the girl's name!"

    "I know her face, though!  I'll recognise her, you can
depend on it!  And if you won't expel her at least you can
cane that young madam's behind until she won't sit down for a
week!  And you can get her parents to pay for my dry-cleaning,
too.  The impudent minx!  Pushing me off a bus!" Margaret
Scott-Blythe was quite unable to conceive that she herself
could have been at all responsible for the incident.  So far
as she was concerned the girl had deliberately pushed her off
the bus - the fact that she had run off proved it.  She
continued:

    "Take me round the classrooms, Jean.  I'll recognise that
young lady soon enough".

    Mrs Taylor grimaced.  She was not attracted to the idea of
the elderly school governor going around the school treating
every class like an identification parade in a police station. 
"All right, Margaret," she conceded "I will cane the girl if
we find her.  From what you tell me it is clear that she
deserves condign punishment.  But perhaps we could narrow the
field down a bit.  Do you know roughly how old the girl was?
Could you estimate the form she'd be in?"

    Mrs Scott-Blythe thought for a second or two.  "Not a
little girl," she said "definitely not.  At least fourth form
or above.  A tall girl.  Shortish brown hair."

    "All right," said Mrs Taylor.  She pulled open a drawer. 
"I really don't want to disturb the girls' classes more than
is absolutely necessary," she said.  "I've got photographs
here of every form in the school taken last term.  This one's
the fourth form."

    Mrs Scott-Blythe inspected the proffered photograph
carefully, looking closely at each girl's smiling face. 
Finally she handed it back to the headmistress.  "She's not
there, Jean," she said.

    The photo of the fifth form was similarly scanned, again
without success.  As Mrs Taylor passed the photograph of the
sixth formers over she hoped that Mrs Scott-Blythe's scrutiny
would be fruitless once more.  She disliked using the cane at
all, although she had not felt able to deny Mrs Scott-Blythe's
request in the circumstances, and she had only very rarely
used it on sixth formers.  Apart from a very small minority of
girls who simply refused to be sensible she felt that her
sixth formers were mature enough not to need the cane - she
preferred to reason with them.

    So she hoped that it was all an egregious mistake of
Mrs Scott-Blythe's and that she would not recognise anyone
from the photo.  After all sixth formers wore a different
uniform to that of the rest of the school and Margaret had not
said anything about that.  But, after another systematic
inspection, the school governor pointed at one of the girls in
the photograph.  "That's the girl," she said.  "Let's get her
in here right away!"

    The headmistress looked at the picture where
Mrs Scott-Blythe was pointing.  "Are you sure, Margaret?" she
asked.  "That's Helen Warwick.  She's one of the best-behaved
girls at the school.  She's a prefect!  She couldn't have done
it!"

    "Oh, yes, Jean.  I'm absolutely sure!  I told you I'd
remember her face.  A fine sort of a prefect she is!  Calls
the chairman of the board of governors an old cow and pushes
me off the bus!  You should expel her!  But if you won't then
I insist that you give that young madam a sore bottom that
she'll remember for the rest of her days.  I'm quite sure,
Jean.  Just get here and you'll see her reaction when she
spots me."

    "All right, Margaret.  I think you're mistaken, but I'll
call her in and we'll see.  If it is she I think that four
strokes of the cane will teach her a salutary lesson."  But
Mrs Scott-Blythe was not satisfied with this.  She knew that
under the school rules the headmistress was empowered to
administer up to eight strokes to sixth formers and insisted
that this was a case for the maximum penalty.  Mrs Taylor did
not really agree but did not want an argument with the
chairman of the governors.  And Helen Warwick was probably
completely innocent in this matter anyway.  The headmistress
dialled an internal code on her 'phone and spoke to her
secretary:

    "Amanda, could you find Helen Warwick of the Upper Sixth
for me, please, and ask her to come here.  She should be in
room 54 for an English Literature class."

    Helen was very surprised at the unexpected summons, but
was not displeased at escaping from a very boring lesson
dealing with the possible influences of Boccaccio on Chaucer's
House of Fame.

    "Do you know what this is about, Mandy?" she asked as they
walked along the corridor together.  Mandy Collins, the
headmistress's secretary, was only a couple of years older
than the sixth form girls and was on first name terms with
most of them.

    "No, I've got no idea at all," Mandy replied, concealing
the fact that she had a very strong suspicion.  "It's very
unusual for Mrs Taylor to send for someone in the middle of
class like this." She paused and then said, with a nervous
little half laugh "You haven't got any sins on your
conscience, I suppose, Helen?"

    Helen smiled back.  "No it can't be anything like that. 
Maybe it's the theatre trip." As President of the girls' drama
club Helen was involved with the organisation of this event. 
It never occurred to her to think about the morning's episode. 
So far as she was concerned she had been pestered by a silly
old woman and had got away from her.  And as it had all taken
place out of school and as the woman didn't know her name nor,
so far as she was aware, that of her school she could not
imagine that this was connected to her summons.

    Mandy still had her doubts, though.  It was not like
Mrs Taylor to call a girl out of class just to discuss a
school trip.  She could have asked to see her during break or
when she had a free study period.  During her time at the
school Mandy had only twice had to call a girl to Mrs Taylor's
office during lesson time and both incidents had ended the
same way  - with the girl concerned stumbling tearfully out of
the office with her hands clasped to an obviously very painful
bottom.  Mrs Taylor hadn't sounded in a good mood at all,
either.

    And there was another factor which suggested to Mandy
that, surprising as it seemed, the eighteen year old prefect
might be on her way to a caning.  The secretary had seen the
chairman of the board of governors burst through her office
and into Mrs Taylor's, clearly in the vilest of tempers.  It
had evidently been she who had induced the headmistress to
send for the sixth former.  She mentioned this to Helen.

    "Do you know Mrs Scott-Blythe, Helen?" she asked.

    Helen shook her head.  The name meant nothing to her.

    "She's the chairman of the governors," Mandy informed her. 
But Helen could still not imagine what it could all mean and
remained unworried.

    Mandy was almost, but not quite, sure that it could all
only mean one thing.  She wondered whether she should alert
Helen to the real likelihood that, for whatever reason, she
was going to have her bottom caned.  She felt that it would be
an even worse shock if the girl was totally unprepared for it.

    The other two girls whom she had escorted in similar
circumstances had known only too well what they had to expect. 
They had both been very much younger than Helen, too, one in
the second form and one in the third form.  She remembered how
little Karen Charlton, the second former, had walked along
desperately slowly, obviously feeling very sorry for herself
and looking dismally as though she was ready to start crying
at any moment.  Tracy Sharp had also known why she'd been sent
for.  She had put up more of a show of bravado than had Karen,
even making a joke to Mandy on the way to the office.  But the
self-confident Tracy had not been able to hide her tears when
she stumbled out of the headmistress's office into Mandy's
after the infliction.  Sympathetically the secretary had
handed the sobbing fourteen year old a handful of tissues from
the box she kept ready for such events.

    Mrs Taylor used her cane only rarely, perhaps five or six
times a term.  But Mandy was well aware that the headmistress
was a real expert in the infliction of corporal punishment and
that when she thought a caning was justified she laid it on
good and hard and used all her skill.  Tracy was by no means
the only pupil whom Mandy had seen confident in her ability to
take a caning before a visit to the headmistress's sanctum and
crying and whimpering afterwards.  

    Mandy herself was no stranger to the cane.  She had
attended a local secondary modern where all the teachers were
allowed to use the cane and most, especially the deputy
headmaster, did - on girls as well as boys.  Most of Mandy's
punishments had been on the hands but she had known the
humiliation and the pain of a well-caned bottom on two
occasions, the last time only four years previously.  However
she was sure that Mrs Taylor caned a good deal harder than any
teacher she had known before.  She caned infrequently, but she
caned to hurt and few girls came back for a second dose.

    The pensive Mandy glanced at the prefect walking happily
beside her, serenely unaware of anything untoward.  She
couldn't warn her.  Really, she could hardly believe herself
that the tall eighteen year old could be due for a caning.  It
was just that she couldn't think what else it could be!

    Mandy and Helen entered the secretary's office and walked
through it to the door to the headmistress's room.  Mandy
knocked on the door and opened it, ushering Helen in.  Then
she went back to her desk to await developments.

    Inside the office Helen's surprised reaction at the sight
of Mrs Scott- Blythe clearly showed that the school governor
had got the right girl.  Mrs Taylor breathed deeply.  She
really didn't want to have to cane a nice, clever and usually
well-behaved and good mannered girl like Helen Warwick, but it
seemed she had no choice.

    Mrs Taylor put the school governor's account of the
morning's events to the shocked sixth former, and asked her
what she had to say for herself.  Poor Helen was absolutely
dismayed at the sight of her antagonist and the revelation
that she was a governor of the school and could scarcely
mumble a reply.  It was practically all true, anyway, except
that Mrs Scott-Blythe made the accident that had resulted in
her tumble from the bus seem more deliberate on Helen's part
than had really been the case.

    The headmistress was angry now at the stupidity of a
trusted sixth former which had put her in this embarrassing
position.  She began to pronounce sentence.

    She said that no girl who behaved as Helen had that
morning could remain a prefect and made her unpin her
prefect's badge from her blazer and hand it over to her.  She
told her that from then on she would lose all the privileges
of a prefect which she had previously enjoyed, saying that her
actions clearly showed her to be unfit for a position of
responsibility and privilege.  Helen's fingers trembled as she
removed the badge.  She had been so proud of being a prefect! 
The thought of what her parents, her friends and the other
girls would think about her degradation from that status was
awful.  She knew that junior girls to whom she had given lines
or whom she had reported for misbehaviour would seize their
opportunity to get their own back.  The loss of that badge was
a an awful punishment for her.  But she soon realised that
there was worse to come.

    "Girls of this school are expected to uphold the good name
of this school at all times," the headmistress continued. 
"Rudely pushing in in front of somebody at a bus queue as you
did this morning is inexcusable.  You were wearing school
uniform and everyone who saw the incident must have received a
very bad impression of the behaviour of this school's girls. 
Especially if they noticed that you were supposed to be a
prefect.  What a terrible example!  I would be more than
justified in inflicting severe punishment for this alone.

    "But then your behaviour grew even more outrageous.  When
Mrs Scott- Blythe, quite rightly, upbraided you, you refused
to give her your name and actually insulted a school governor
in front of an entire bus load of passengers.  Finally it
seems you went to the unheard of extreme of actually
physically assaulting her!

    "Mrs Scott-Blythe has requested that, in view of the
seriousness of your behaviour, I should cane you.  I am sorry
about this.  I never enjoy having to use the cane and I am
always reluctant to cane senior girls.  I am especially
unhappy when it is necessary to cane a sixth former like
yourself who has never before been sent to me for punishment. 
But your outrageous behaviour has left me with no alternative. 
You will receive eight strokes of the senior cane on your
backside over one layer of clothing."

    Mrs Scott-Blythe intervened.  She made her opinion clear
to the headmistress that Helen's punishment should be on her
bare flesh.  But Mrs Taylor reminded her that the school rules
made it clear that a girl had to be punished over one layer of
clothing the first time she received the cane, although
subsequent times could be on the bare at the discretion of the
headmistress.  Helen Warwick had never been caned before.  She
turned back to face the teenager who was standing unsteadily,
all colour drained from her face, in a state of shock. 
Helen's consternation at hearing her sentence pronounced by
the headmistress had been such that she had not even noticed
Mrs Scott-Blythe's attempt to have it increased.

    "This will not be a light punishment, Helen.  As you know
I do not use the cane except in cases of very serious
misbehaviour which can be dealt with in no other way.  So when
I do use it I make sure that the girl concerned really feels
the effect.  I can assure you that after eight strokes of the
senior cane you will be profoundly repenting your behaviour
earlier this morning.  It will be a long time before you sit
down, on a bus or anywhere else, without feeling a shameful,
and painful, reminder of your punishment!  

    "You are a senior girl and I shall administer an
appropriately severe punishment.  It is no more than you
deserve and I shall expect you to remain in position
throughout, until I tell you that you may stand."

    Mrs Taylor stopped talking.  She moved over to a small
cupboard, took a key from her pocket and unlocked it.  Then
she reached in and withdrew a long rattan cane eight
millimetres in diameter.  It had a crook handle bound in red
tape.  This was Mrs Taylor's 'special' cane.  Helen's eyes
followed the headmistress's every move and widened in horror
at the sight of the punishment implement - the first time she
had ever seen a cane.

    "Now, remove your blazer and bend over my desk!" ordered
the headmistress, swishing the cane viciously through the air. 
Mrs Taylor was merely re-acquainting herself with this
particular cane as it was a long time since she had last used
it, but Helen flinched as she saw just how wickedly supple it
was.  Mrs Scott-Blythe smiled as she saw Helen's reaction -
whatever Mrs Taylor gave that little madam it wouldn't be
enough for her.

    The teenager seemed to have lost the power to protest. 
The completely unexpected shock of these recent events made
her react like an automaton.  Tears pricked at her eyes as she
removed her blazer, put it over the back of a chair and slowly
turned back towards the headmistress's large desk.  

     Over the desk, girl!" instructed the headmistress
brusquely.

    Bending over the desk did not present the same problem for
the tall Helen that it did for most of the girls at Evershead
School in similar circumstances.  She stretched herself easily
over the large desk and took a grip on the opposite edge. 
When she was in position Mrs Taylor took hold of the hem of
the sixth former's navy blue skirt and carefully rolled it up,
together with her slip, revealing a pair of white panties
with a pink motif.  The teenager's rounded and fully-mature
buttocks stretched out the thin material, which disappeared
into the deep bottom cleft.  Helen's long legs trembled and
moved from side to side, causing her bottom cheeks to change
shape intriguingly.  Mrs Taylor picked up a safety pin from
her desk and pinned the girl's skirt and slip in place.

    The headmistress placed the cane across the girl's
trembling behind.  Helen drew a hurried deep breath and her
muscles tensed.  Suddenly, in one practised movement, the
headmistress raised the cane high in the air and then lashed
it down with full force across the sixth former's panties and
across the exposed pink flesh of her bottom.

    WHACK!!

    Helen's response was instantaneous.  As the cane landed a
shudder seemed to pass through her entire body.  With a
high-pitched yelp the girl leapt up and twisted round in
mid-air, her hands flying to her injured buttocks.  Quivering
on unsteady legs she stood facing the headmistress, her pretty
face contorted in pain, eyes wide with shock, nostrils
distended and her lips moving strangely.  As Mandy had feared
Helen had not had time to brace herself for the prospect of
getting the cane.  And never in her wildest dreams had she
imagined that even the whole punishment could hurt as much as
that single stroke had done.  Her hands instinctively massaged
her bottom where she could feel a weal swelling painfully
beneath the thin material of her panties.  

    Outside the door Mandy Collins had heard the loud impact
of the cane across Helen's tightly stretched panties and also
the teenager's vociferous reaction.  She had been right!  She
could still not guess at the reason but nice, quiet,
well-mannered Helen Warwick, sixth form prefect was certainly
getting whacked!  To her credit Mandy's first thoughts were of
sympathy with the eighteen year old.  She knew what Helen must
be going through.  She'd been there herself!

    Inside the headmistress's office Mrs Taylor was rather
less sympathetic.  "How dare you, Warwick!" she shouted, with
real anger in her voice.  "I told you that you were to receive
eight strokes and that you were to remain in position until I
told you to get up."  Helen started to say something, but the
headmistress interrupted.  "I know it hurts.  It's meant to
hurt!  And it's going to hurt a lot more before I've finished
with you!  There's nothing special about your bottom, girl. 
It's there to be caned when you're naughty just the same as
any other girl at this school!

    "Now, get it back over that desk right away.  I'll give
you a chance this time as you've never been sent here for the
cane before.  But if you jump up again, or put your hands in
the way or do anything to try to avoid punishment again I will
ask Mrs Scott-Blythe to hold you securely in position.  And
you will then receive not just the eight strokes of your
original penalty but an additional two strokes for trying to
avoid punishment!"

    Large tears started to fall down Helen's ashen cheeks. 
For a moment it looked as though she was about to say
something, but her eyes dropped in shame before the stern gaze
of the headmistress.  Taking deep breaths she withdrew her
hands from the back of her panties, turned round and
reluctantly lowered herself across the desk.  This time she
gripped the opposite edge more tightly, as hard as she could. 
Helen had not guessed that just one stroke of the cane could
possibly impart so much stinging pain but she was not a
coward.  She knew that other girls in her class had taken
eight strokes from Mrs Taylor and, although events had moved
so fast that she hardly understood how she had come to be in
this situation, she was now determined not to make a fuss and
to give Mrs Taylor no excuse to award the two extra penalty
strokes.

    When she was back in place the headmistress waited a few
seconds looking at the girl's quivering bottom already showing
the effect of its first ever cane stroke.  Then she raised the
cane up above her shoulders and cracked it down to land about
an inch below the emerging marks.

    WHACK!!

    "Aarrrgh!" Helen was unable to restrain a loud cry and her
body jerked violently across the desk as the pain bit home. 
But this time Helen had known better what to expect and she
managed to hold on to the other side of the desk and to stay
in place despite the blazing sensations pouring out her
bottom.

    Mrs Taylor allowed a lengthy interval before the next
stroke.  This was not designed for Helen's benefit, however,
but rather the reverse.  The headmistress always intended
naughty girls to understand that in order to pay the penalty
for their misdeeds they had to submit passively to their
deserved punishment, remaining in their humiliating position
until they were told to rise and never knowing when to expect
the next searing instalment of the cane.

    WHACKK!!

    "Owwww!  Aaah!  Aaah!  Aaah!"

    Finally the cane whipped down for the third time for the
hardest stroke yet.  Helen yelled loudly and continued to gasp
in anguish as she squirmed wildly over the desk, kicking out
her long shapely legs.  Her movements caused the elastic in
her panties to rub over the rising welts, making the awful
pain even worse.

    "Stay still, Warwick!" ordered Mrs Taylor.

    Poor Helen tried her best to obey but could not quite
succeed and her intensely painful bottom continued to bounce
up and down.

    Mrs Taylor, as an experienced caner, was unsurprised at
this and calmly timed her next stroke to collide with the
shaking buttocks just as they rose to their highest point
causing them to wobble like a jelly in a wind.

    WHACKK!!

    "Aaaaowww!  Aaaaowww!  Ooowwwh!"  she shrieked, whipping
her head back in sheer agony, her brown hair flying.

    Helen's loud shrieks filled the room and she twisted her
head round towards the  headmistress, her left hand losing its
grip on the desk to come back towards her bottom.  "Please,
ma'am," the girl begged tearfully, "please!  No more!"

    But Mrs Taylor was implacable.  Left to herself she might
well have agreed that the four strokes Helen had received,
together with the loss of her prefectship, was adequate
punishment.  But there was no doubt that this was a case where
the full eight strokes had been fully warranted and the girl
had been told that this was what she would get.  

    "Hand out of the way, Warwick," she said impassively,
"there are four strokes to come."

    With an gasping sigh of despair Helen wriggled back flat
across the desk and withdrew her hand.  For once Mrs Taylor
did not wait.  She raised the cane above her head and brought
it slicing down.

    WHACKK!!

    This time the cane, although landing very close to the
previous stroke, did not fall across the whole of Helen's
bottom.  Instead the tip dug deep into the bare flesh of the
girl's right buttock where her panties fell away.

    Helen was yelling and sobbing continuously now but,
paradoxically, that vicious stroke shocked her into silence
for a moment.  It was only for a moment, though, and then the
eighteen year old howled at the top of her voice, her body
writhing across the hard desk.  Mrs Taylor looked on patiently
as the teenager yelled herself out.  She knew that that last
stroke must have really hurt and that Helen would carry the
bruise left by the cane's tip for a good time to come.

    The sixth former screamed hysterically and squirmed in
agony, but continued to grasp the desk's edge convulsively. 
Mrs Scott-Blythe was smiling broadly.  She had many faults to
find with Mrs Taylor but she could not deny that the
headmistress knew how to cane a naughty girl's bottom!  This
was just what that young hooligan deserved.

    Mrs Taylor now showed her expertise by waiting even longer
before continuing the punishment.  It was well over a minute
and Helen's yells were finally beginning to die away before
the headmistress raised her cane again.

    This time as the cane lashed mercilessly down, landing
across the wealed flesh of Helen's incredibly sore backside,
it was just too much.  With  a heart-rending shriek that made
the listening Mandy outside the office gasp with sympathy, the
tall eighteen year old lost her grip on the desk and jumped
bolt upright, her hands going again to the back of her
panties.

    "Get down, girl!" exclaimed Mrs Taylor exasperatedly. 
"There are still two strokes to come!"

    Poor Helen tried to speak, but the words would not come. 
She wanted to plead for mercy but could only gasp and squeal
unintelligibly as her delicate fingers tried vainly to relieve
the unprecedented pain in her rear.

    "This is your last chance, Warwick," said the
headmistress.  "I wasn't bluffing.  If you don't get yourself
back across that desk this instant you'll be held down.  And
you won't be getting just two extra strokes, but four!"

    The caned girl made no move to obey.  She stood there,
moving from foot to foot, shaking in every part of her body. 
Tears poured down her pretty face and her large breasts
bounced under her white blouse as she desperately struggled to
come to terms with the pain.  The headmistress turned towards
Mrs Scott-Blythe for assistance.

    "Would you mind helping, Margaret?" she enquired.

    Mrs Scott-Blythe did not mind at all.  She grasped the
squirming girl firmly and, ignoring her struggling and cries,
manhandled her down over the desk and held her securely in
place.

    "You now have four strokes to come, Warwick," announced
the head-mistress, "and you have only your own stupidity to
blame!"

    The hard-hearted chairman of the governors was still not
satisfied.  She pointed out to Mrs Taylor that the two
additional strokes were for refusing to take punishment, which
was a separate offence from that for which the original eight
had been allotted.  Therefore she insisted that the final two
strokes be applied to Helen's bare behind with her panties
down.  The headmistress, angry at having been so badly let
down by one of her prefects and at the loss of so much of her
morning, agreed.

    Although securely held Helen continued to kick her long
legs as the headmistress laid on the last two of her original
eight strokes.  Then Mrs Taylor pulled down the girl's
panties, ignoring her frantic protests and pleas and her
distress as the elastic grazed the raised weals on her swollen
bottom.

    When the girl's panties were down about her knees
Mrs Taylor stood back and regarded the juddering
cane-decorated bottom.  Clearly it would be some time before
young Helen Warwick would be able to sit down without getting
a painful reminder of her disgraceful behaviour and its
outcome.  She raised the cane again.

    WHACKK!! 

    Despite Helen's lack of protection the seventh cut was
even more severe than its predecessors, biting deeply into the
girl's scissoring thighs.  Mrs Scott-Blythe felt the struggles
of the ex-prefect become even more frenzied and frenetic but
she held her securely, taking pleasure from the distorted
expressions of agony on Helen's pretty face.

    There was another long pause before the delivery of the
last stroke of all.  Mrs Taylor waited until her cries had
subsided somewhat and her wild kickings and twistings in the
arms of Mrs Scott-Blythe had died down a little.  Then she
took two paces back and lashed down the final stroke with a
forward step.  She aimed it diagonally across the expanse of
the girl's devastated bottom to cross as many strokes as
possible.

    The eighteen year old responded with another wild shriek
of agony, her body writhing in Mrs Scott-Blythe's secure
grasp.  Mrs Taylor calmly regarded the punished backside,
completely reddened and covered with weal marks and incipient
bruises, for a few moments and then indicated to
Mrs Scott-Blythe that she could release her hold on the girl.  

    When she did so Helen squirmed off the desk and twisted
round to face the headmistress.  She had to hold the desk with
one hand to help her unsteady legs to support her weight while
her other hand was tenderly trying to bring some comfort to
her pain-gushing bottom.  Her panties were down by her ankles
now and the teenager looked a proper sight as she hopped from
foot to foot, breathing in deep breast-shaking gasps, tears
still streaming down her face, naked from the waist down.

    "Stop that, you disgusting girl!" ordered Mrs Taylor. 
"Pull your panties up!"

    Helen obeyed immediately - the headmistress was still
holding that awful cane!  Rather to Mrs Scott-Blythe's
amusement she winced and squealed and gasped in anguish as she
manipulated the panties upwards over her swollen and stinging
behind.  When she had finally succeeded Mrs Taylor made her
turn round and unpinned her slip and skirt so that they fell
down over the damaged area.

    With both hands now pressed to the seat of her skirt the
caned ex-prefect stood facing her headmistress on unsteady
legs.  Mrs Taylor made her apologise to Mrs Scott-Blythe, and
Helen tearfully did so.  The chairman of the governors
accepted the apology serenely, shaking Helen's sweaty and
trembling palm and saying, "I hope that this is a lesson to
you, young lady - naughty schoolgirls get sore bottoms!"

    Mrs Taylor told Helen to stand facing the wall with her
hands behind her neck.  The girl obeyed but was unable to
stand still properly yet and continued to shift her weight
from one leg to the other as the tears carried on falling from
her reddened eyes.

    The headmistress asked Mrs Scott-Blythe to sit down and
called Mandy on the internal 'phone to ask for two cups of
coffee.  The secretary couldn't help glancing at Helen as she
walked in.  She bit her lip at the sight of the tall eighteen
year old standing facing the wall wriggling in pain.

    "Thank you, Amanda," said Mrs Taylor.  "Would you please
take Warwick out to your room now and complete the paperwork. 
The girl has received eight strokes of the cane over one layer
of clothing for disgraceful behaviour in public and for
assaulting a school governor and an additional two strokes,
panties down, for refusal to accept punishment.

    "Warwick has forfeited her position as a prefect and I
would be obliged if you would move her belongings from the
Prefects' Room to the Sixth Form Common Room when you have an
opportunity.

    "She may remain in your office until the bell for next
period goes, to recover herself and then I will come out to
take her to her next lesson and explain matters to her class
teacher."  Throughout this speech Mrs Taylor did not look
towards Helen at all, as if the caned girl was beneath her
contempt.

    When they were back in her office Mandy passed her box of
tissues to Helen without a word and made the entries in the
Punishment Book.  She was not quite sure what to put in the
section for Form.  Helen had been Upper 6 Prefect, but now it
seemed she was just Upper 6.  Mandy left it as "U6" and
decided to check with Mrs Taylor later if that was correct.

    Poor Helen continued to weep in shame and at the
continuing smarting from her outraged bottom.  The original
intense overpowering stinging was beginning to fade but Helen
was looking forward in horror to the bell when the
headmistress would take her to the next lesson and her
disgrace would be publicised.  To make matters worse her
teacher for that lesson was Mr Walker, a handsome young man on
whom Helen had rather a crush!  

    Mandy watched her concernedly not knowing what to say. 
Finally she ventured: "I'm sorry Helen!  I did try to warn
you.  I just wish I'd been wrong!"

    Helen shook her head to show that she appreciated Mandy's
words, but she did not feel ready to speak yet.  After about
five minutes she felt a bit better and asked Mandy how long
the awful pain would last.

    Mandy could not really help, however.  She told Helen that
the stinging should die down quite quickly but then it
depended on how badly she'd been bruised.  She advised Helen
not to carry on holding her bottom, though, it didn't stop the
pain and the other girls would only make fun.  Finally it was
time for the next lesson and Mrs Taylor marched Helen off,
every step hurting, for the shameful details of what had
happened to be related to her teacher and classmates.