New Term at St Elia’s

Story from Janus 27 by Johnny Chesham

Penelope Forster sat in the railway carriage looking out at the Sussex Downs with a resentful expression on her pretty, freckled face. Tomorrow was first day of term at St Elia’s High School for Girls and any minute now she would be joined by all the other schoolgirls reminding her that her freedom was over. She had enjoyed the vac and met a super boy too, but now she was back to all the rules and discipline of a strict girls’ boarding school.

As the train drew into the junction she saw hordes of girls in the blue and white striped blazers of St Elia’s swarming about in straw hats, navy blue gym-slips and white knee-length socks, waving hockey sticks and satchels, reminding her all too clearly of the school life she was so tired of.

In a flash she saw the answer: ‘Of course,’ she thought, ‘I’ll get myself expelled!’

Why hadn’t she thought of it before? St Elia’s was full of rules and regulations that everyone tried not to break. If she set out to break them all surely they’d pack her off in no time, back home to where that handsome young man had been so interested in her uniform and even asked her to pose in it for him!

The others piled into the carriage. Among them was Georgina Worsley, a slim, attractive young lady with long brunette curls who slept next to Penelope in blue dorm. They were best friends, both fed up with St Elia’s and both keen on the boys from the village who always looked at them and whistled when they walked by in their short navy gymslips and white blouses. Georgina was Form Captain this term and wore a new metal shield on her blazer lapel.

‘Hello, Penny!’ she said. ‘I spotted you looking miserable from down the platform!’ she added with a smile.

‘Hello, Georgie!’ Penny replied laughing. ‘You’re right, I was down in the dumps, but now I think I’ve got an idea to put everything right!’

‘Oh, tell me all,’ asked Georgie intrigued.

‘Not now,’ Penny said with a glance towards a Senior Prefect in a nearby seat, ‘Wait until tonight.’

An hour later the train drew into Castleton and crowds of schoolgirls leapt onto the platform. Last term some girls from Oakwood Priory, the nearby day school, had caused a row and sure enough there were a few in their uniform of grey blazers, grey pleated skirts, berets and ankle socks. There was a sudden hush, however, when onto the platform strode Miss Faversham, Headmistress of St Elia’s, an attractive but severe looking woman in her forties with an air of authority which brought instant obedience. Surrounded by Prefects, she directed the girls to taxis and buses in a swift and orderly fashion, an imposing and elegant figure in tweed suit and brogues.

Penny and Georgie trudged up the drive to St Elia’s, a rambling but impressive ivy-covered building surrounded by playing fields. The afternoon passed in busy new term formalities and both girls were glad when it was time for dorm. They took off their blazers and gymslips, put them carefully away and sat on their steel-framed beds in bras and navy-blue cotton knickers.

‘Oh, I nearly forgot,’ Georgina said, ‘What’s this great idea of yours?’

‘Quite simple!’ replied her friend, pausing for effect. ‘I’m going to get myself expelled!’

‘You’re what?’ cried Georgie in amazement and listened with fascination as Penny explained her plan.

‘But what’s more,’ she concluded. ‘I’m going to need your help. Can I count on you?’

Georgie looked seriously at the pretty, blonde schoolgirl for whom she had such admiration and answered, ‘Absolutely, Penny.’

‘I knew you wouldn’t let me down!’ Penny exclaimed and threw her arms around her friend. Any minute now Matron would come round for lights out so they gave each other a quick cuddle and an affectionate good night kiss before climbing into bed.

----//----

Monday afternoon was to be devoted to hockey trials which were of great importance at St Elia’s. Skipping games was a serious offence at any time but missing trials was unthinkable. Everyone would be involved and Penny decided this was her chance to slip away to the village. It was a glorious afternoon as she strolled over the Downs and she soon found herself in her favourite tea shop. She tucked into tea and toast with éclairs and vanilla slices and was thoroughly enjoying herself when she sensed a chilling presence enter the room.

She looked up and sure enough there was Eleanor Burns, the School Captain, and her friend Rosamund Grant.

Eleanor was a very attractive 18-year-old and much admired for her prowess at games, but was also dreaded as a strict disciplinarian with a rather cruel streak. Similarly, Rosamund was a charming Prefect with a winning smile which many felt concealed a rather sadistic disposition. They wore striped blazers and ties but because of their seniority wore short, navy blue pleated skirts with black nylons and suspenders.

‘Now, Forster,’ the Captain intoned, ‘Isn’t it rather early in term to be breaking bounds?’

‘At least Georgina Worsley’s got some school spirit,’ Rosamund Grant added with a knowing sneer.

Good old Georgie, thought Penelope! Now for it, she said to herself, no good doing things by half. She looked up calmly at her superiors and said firmly: ‘Why don’t you two piss off?’

They stood there stunned with open mouths. After a second Rosamund collected herself enough to say ‘That’s enough to get you expelled.’

Thank God for that, thought Penny. But suddenly Eleanor’s eyes flashed and she said with a cruel smile, ‘No, I think we’ll deal with this young lady ourselves. Miss Faversham is extremely busy with trials and shouldn’t be disturbed.’

Oh no, thought Penny! It was a rule at St Elia’s that the School Captain could at her discretion administer corporal punishment. Penny had assumed she would be sent straight to Miss Faversham for an offence they all knew was worthy of expulsion, but Eleanor Burns had decided she would forgo that for the immense pleasure of herself giving Penelope Forster the beating of her life!

‘Report to my study in thirty minutes,’ she added crisply as the two seniors turned and walked smartly out of the tea rooms attracting appreciative glances from a parson and businessman at a nearby table.

Penny looked down at the éclairs in dismay. It had all gone wrong! She had bitten off much more than she could chew and now she would simply have to take the punishment though she shuddered at the thought.

She trudged back to St Elia’s with her head bowed and made her way through the oak-panelled corridors to the School Captain’s Study. She hesitated outside the door and trembled at the sound of a cane swishing repeatedly through the air. She winced as she heard Rosamund’s voice say ‘Try this thin one’. For a moment she thought of bunking but knew there was no escape. Biting her lip and tensing herself from head to toe she knocked on the door.

‘Enter,’ a firm, stern voice rang out.

Eleanor Burns and Rosamund Grant stood arms folded behind a polished mahogany desk, to the rear a mantelpiece on which stood a number of cups and trophies. Framed photos of hockey and netball teams lined the panelled walls. On the desk reposed a selection of straight and crook-handled canes, an old gym shoe and a wire hair brush.

‘Take your knickers off,’ the School Captain said matter-of-factly.

Penny blushed. She bent down, put her hands up her gymslip and pulled her regulation navy blue cotton knickers down to her knees, standing there in helpless humiliation with her head bowed and eyes down.

The School Captain looked at her knickers with a sneer and ordered, ‘Touch your toes!’

Penelope bent down obediently and touched her toes with her fingertips. Eleanor Burns flexed a pliant, straight cane. She walked round the desk, probed the cane under the offender’s gym-slip and disdainfully flicked it forward to reveal the firm, pink orbs of her buttocks. Rosamund Grant took off her blazer and picked up the gym shoe with a smile. Penelope held her breath, every muscle taut, for what seemed like an eternity.

Suddenly the gym shoe smacked into her left buttock with an almighty stinging THWACKKK!

She shrieked out her pain, but before the shock left her it hit again and again in rapid succession. She winced in agony, biting her lip as the stinging rubber rained down on her reddening cheeks harder and harder. Rosamund hammered the shoe down with mighty blows, the smacks of hard rubber on tender bare buttock flesh ringing round the study mingling with Penny’s yells and moans. Her face contorted in pain as she reached a plateau of panic that she just couldn’t stand any more. As if by telepathy Rosamund Grant, by now breathing rather heavily, stood straight and stopped.

Thank God, thought Penny, slightly raising herself.

‘How dare you move without permission!’ Eleanor almost screamed. ‘That was just the warm up!’

Penny’s spirits sank and she braced herself again in dismay. The School Captain selected a long, thin, crook-handled cane from the desk and positioned herself with legs apart and left hand on the small of Penelope’s back. Penny squeezed every muscle vice-like in an agony of anticipation. She could hear cheering from the hockey field and thought what she would give to be out there now.

Suddenly the cane slashed through the air and landed like a razor on Penny’s naked, red buttocks!

‘YEOWWW!’ she shrieked out in shock and pain. Eleanor raised her right arm high and brought the cane down with tremendous power again and again in mighty strokes. Penny’s efforts to maintain some self-control and dignity suddenly collapsed and she burst into floods of tears. Deep red weals crisscrossed the firm young buttocks as Penny yelled out her anguish uncontrollably, tears now pouring down her red cheeks.

Lumpy red welts blossomed under the firm, persistent lash of the angry cane, Eleanor’s face set in determined concentration as she rained down blow after blow on the twin, quivering cheeks by now flaming red with thin bluish bruises. Penny yelled out in torment as each new cane stroke whipped into her agonised buttocks now red raw from the relentless bombardment.

Rosamund looked on at her friend’s superb performance and flushed with unashamed admiration.

The School Captain steadied herself and suddenly transferred the long, whistling strokes to Penelope’s upper legs — a new and unsuspecting target. Bright red lines immediately appeared in the firm, pink flesh below the inflamed buttocks as Penny shrieked and sobbed. Eleanor inflicted more and more flashing strokes of the merciless cane as if possessed by an inexhaustible energy. Penny’s face was now a contorted mask of pain, wailing and sobbing very loudly.

The bell for Evensong suddenly rang out but Eleanor seemed oblivious as she lashed the whipping, swiping cane into the raw bruised cheeks now all bright crimson. Rosamund Grant, looking slightly concerned, coughed quietly and the School Captain looked up flushed with blazing eyes and slowly ran her fingers down the length of the cane.

‘You are dismissed, Forster,’ she said with a slight thickness in her voice.

Penny slowly raised herself and pulled up her navy-blue knickers around the flaming cheeks of her backside which were chafed unbearably by the tight elastic. She held her handkerchief to her eyes while with the other hand she tried to give some comfort to her throbbing buttocks.

Crying openly and with her eyes fixed to the ground Penny curtsied, said ‘Thank you, Miss Burns,’ and ran from the room.

Rosamund rushed up to Eleanor, planted a warm kiss on her full, sullen lips and blurted with real feeling: ‘Good show, Captain!’

----//----

Georgina gasped at the sight that greeted her on entering the dorm. Penny was lying face down on her bed with her knickers around her ankles, her hands clasped round her bright crimson buttocks as she sobbed her heart out into the pink pillowcase.

‘Darling!’ Georgie cried out in shock and rushed to her friend’s side.

Penny looked at her through tear-filled eyes and slowly described the events leading to the beating of her life. Georgina laid her hockey stick by the bed and reached into her locker.

‘Let’s try some of this,’ she said, taking out a white glass jar of cold cream. She scooped out a handful of the smooth white cream and gently laid it on Penny’s left buttock. It felt like ice on a burning desert. Lovingly she spread it carefully around the delightful curved forms, bringing some slight comfort to the ravaged flesh and hard, raised welts that had now appeared.

Penny squealed as the seared nerves protested but lay passive, gladly accepting the gentle massaging palms and the fragrant viscous cream. Georgie’s hands took on a life of their own as they gently moulded the perfect curves of Penny’s bottom and thighs. Poor old Penny, she thought with deep sympathy and was about to lean down and plant a gentle kiss on the scorched, tormented flesh when the door suddenly opened and Matron walked briskly into the dorm.

‘What on earth is going on here?’ she exclaimed in her Scottish brogue.

Matron was a quite attractive woman in her late thirties wearing a blue tunic with white apron and hat rather like a staff nurse in appearance. Around her waist she wore a thick blue leather belt. She was a sensible, no nonsense type of nurse with very strong views about the upbringing of teenage girls.

‘Awfully sorry, Matron,’ answered Georgina, quickly withdrawing a hand which seemed to have strayed between Penny’s thighs. ‘Penelope’s rather sore and I was just trying to soften her skin a little.’

Matron looked at them for a moment with searching eyes as if assessing the truth of the situation. Her frown of suspicion finally softened and Georgina breathed a momentary sigh of relief.

‘That’s as maybe,’ answered Matron, picking up the jar. ‘But what, may I ask, is THIS?’

Georgie shuddered. One of the strictest rules at St Elia’s was that all cosmetic substances were expressly forbidden and Matron was notorious for her rigid enforcement of this rule. She knew she could expect no mercy. With a look of immense distaste Matron confiscated the jar and put it in her apron.

‘You will both report to Miss Faversham at 9.30 tomorrow morning,’ she ordered frostily and strode purposefully out of the dorm.

‘That’s torn it, old girl,’ said Georgie in dismay.

Still face down, Penny groaned.

‘With my luck they still won’t throw me out,’ she responded, knowing she would simply faint if even the slightest punishment were to be inflicted on her tender, ravaged rump the day after such a beating. Even sitting down would be agony all week as she well knew.

‘Chin up, old girl,’ Georgie said without much conviction.

Penny stretched out her arm and their fingers entwined tenderly. Georgie knelt down and stroked Penny’s soft blonde curls. She turned her head and their tired, worried eyes met in a gaze of affection. They leant towards each other and sealed this most wretched of days with the consolation of a loving, good night kiss…

----//----

At 9.30 precisely the two pretty schoolgirls stood side by side in full uniform outside the Headmistress’ Study. On the oak panelled door a shiny brass plate read Miss Cynthia Faversham, M.A. (Oxon.) — Headmistress. They exchanged a last look of apprehension and dread before Georgina bit her lip and knocked faintly on the oak.

No sound emerged from the study except the swish of a cane singing through the air like a rapier, then a thinner cane whistling at a slightly higher pitch.

They looked at each other in dreadful anticipation as a tremendous thwack of the cane hitting an armchair sounded through the heavy door followed by several more in quick succession. They were both afraid of Miss Faversham at the best of times and now each could feel the other’s fear as clearly as her own. Both schoolgirls were pale and trembling as Georgina tried to find courage to knock again.

But suddenly a cultured, stern voice rang out: ‘Enter!’

The two offenders slowly entered the study with heads bowed and hands clasped in front of them, trembling with fright. Much of the study was lined with books; on the mantelpiece a large silver trophy with blue and white ribbons and above it a framed portrait of Her Majesty which dominated the room with an air of regal authority.

In the centre of the study was a large mahogany desk which had been cleared but for the jar of cold cream, three crook-handled canes of varying lengths and thicknesses and a heavy two-foot ruler with an ivory edge. An armchair of well-worn leather was to the left of the desk and to the right French windows looked out onto the playing fields.

Framed in the windows was the tall figure of Miss Faversham flexing a long, straight cane elegantly in front of her with an air of imperious authority. Under her black academic gown she wore an expensive tweed suit, black stockings and stilettos with rather high heels. Her brunette hair fell in neat curls under the tasselled black mortar board. The fine features had a certain aloofness and a rather cold, hard expression was natural to her beauty.

The two offenders stared shamefully down at the carpet in total submission to her supreme authority.

Miss Faversham’s eyes bored into them through her green tortoiseshell spectacles as she pursed her lips preparing to speak.

‘It has been brought to my attention that in flagrant violation of a school rule you, Worsley, have seen fit to introduce this noxious substance onto the school premises,’ she announced gravely whilst indicating the cold cream with a look of grim contempt.

Blushing with shame Georgina bowed her head further and answered in an almost inaudible voice, ‘Yes, Miss Faversham.’

‘It would appear,’ the Headmistress continued, ‘that you, Forster, were an accomplice in this serious offence.’

Penelope cast down her eyes and swallowed, ‘Yes, Miss Faversham.’

The Head’s firm gaze scanned the two offenders standing before her in abject humiliation. She had in fact noticed Worsley during the hockey trials, noting that her figure had matured considerably since last term, something not uncommon in girls of her form and that she was becoming a young lady of considerable charms. Happening to inspect the changing rooms after the game, she had seen Worsley in the shower and her impressions had been confirmed by the lovely young body there revealed to her.

The girls looked down in the silence of immense guilt. The pause seemed endless. Penelope guessed from the Head’s statement that a sound thrashing was inescapable for both of them. Her whole backside was still an aching, red-raw inferno that made moving painful and she simply couldn’t conceive of further chastisement of its tender, ravaged surface.

Miss Faversham, however, had her own ideas.

‘It has also been brought to my attention that you, Forster, were rightly and duly punished yesterday by the School Captain. Nonetheless the offence for which you are now before me undoubtedly merits a sound beating.’

Penny’s head began to swim and she wondered if she was going to faint… the Head was perfectly correct and was entitled to thrash her again… she was shaking with nervousness and confusion… she knew she couldn’t take the pain… and Miss Faversham never altered the rules…

‘However,’ the Head began suddenly, ‘I have decided on this occasion that your punishment will be to fag for the School Captain all term. Furthermore you will be gated for the whole of this term and serve two hours extra work each evening. You are now dismissed.’

Penny couldn’t believe her ears: Miss Faversham wasn’t going to beat her! Every fibre of her body gasped with relief. With a wince she managed a curtsy, said, ‘Thank you, Miss Faversham’ without raising her eyes and walked stiffly from the study, still wondering if she was imagining it.

Georgina looked down nervously at the carpet frightened and alone before the all-powerful figure of the Headmistress. The girl wondered why Penny had been let off, it was most unlike Miss Faversham, and now what would become of her?

The Head scanned the length of the lovely young schoolgirl in striped blazer, gymslip and white socks. She was indeed delightfully pretty. Miss Faversham walked to her desk and picked up the long, heavy ruler, then seated herself in the armchair. Bells chimed in the Sussex landscape.

‘You will position yourself across my knee, Worsley,’ the Headmistress suddenly commanded.

‘Yes, Miss Faversham,’ Georgina replied quietly and walked across the study, her legs like jelly and her head bowed. She dropped obediently to her knees before the imperious figure of the Head, feeling desperately ashamed of herself. Then she leant forward across the tweed skirt with her elbows on the carpet, her face a few inches off the floor.

‘It is my intention to remove your knickers,’ the Headmistress announced with inflexible authority.

‘Yes, Miss Faversham,’ said Georgina blushing deep crimson.

The Headmistress placed her right hand on the schoolgirl’s thigh just above the knee and slowly pushed it under her navy gymslip feeling the exquisite curve of the leg. Her fingers reached the navy-blue cotton knickers but seemed to fumble at the elastic and pass on up to the buttock, smoothing down the creases of the skimpy knickers and moulding the enticing form of her rump. Then an exploring left hand caressed the left thigh and also reached the ripe young cheeks, carefully smoothing down the knickers stretched taut over the soft but firm orbs.

Georgina waited in an agony of tension for the inevitable onslaught to begin. Was it taking a long time or was she just imagining it? She was too distraught to be able to tell.

The Headmistress caressed both buttocks lovingly through soft, cotton knickers… she hardly regretted the other schoolgirl’s absence… suddenly as if collecting herself she slipped her long varnished nails under the elastic at the gusset, indenting the girl’s flesh, then slowly drew the knickers down to the girl’s knees. With her left hand she softly folded the gymslip over, revealing the naked cheeks, like the ceremonial unveiling of some sublime sculpture. They were firm, white and of delightful shape, unblemished but for a few goose pimples and the reddish lines of the elastic.

Georgina gritted her teeth in an agony of anticipation and flushed hot and cold. The silence seemed absolutely endless.

Suddenly Miss Faversham raised the ruler high above her head and brought it swinging down with all her force across both buttocks with a tremendous SMACKKK!

Georgina howled out her shock and pain in a shrieking ‘YEOWWW!’

Before she could begin to absorb the stinging pain of the blow another landed on the same spot, then another and another in rapid succession. Her right leg kicked up involuntarily as the stinging ruler smacked home across her throbbing rump and a first tear rolled down her cheek. Her buttocks went pink and wriggled uncontrollably, she gasped and shrieked as the ruler rose and fell as if possessed of a life of its own. Miss Faversham’s brow knitted in concentration as she rained down one powerful blow after another across the stinging, reddening target.

Georgie’s very pretty face winced and contorted in pain, a mask of perspiration and tears. She gasped at the agonising force of the ruler smacking her tender buttock-cheeks and screamed out as the edge of the merciless ruler wickedly tortured the scarlet flesh.

Sobbing piteously she held her head on the floor as she helplessly endured the shower of blows rained down on her by her relentless Mistress, inwardly begging her to stop but knowing that the slightest protest would only intensify her agony. And how long would the anguish go on? This uncertainty was almost as bad as the pain itself.

As the vicious ruler beat into her rump she vowed she would never again disobey Miss Faversham, so total was her domination.

But at last the ruler rested still on her swollen, searing buttocks. She sobbed, a completely broken spirit, her raw, chastised posterior humbly presented to her mighty Mistress and tormentor.

Miss Faversham surveyed her handiwork. The buttocks and upper thighs were thoroughly red with the odd deeper welt from the ruler’s edge and raised lumps where carefully aimed blows had been imprinted on top of each other. So far so good, she thought.

‘You will now position yourself across the desk,’ the Head commanded sternly. Georgina slowly lifted herself to her feet, now a dishevelled parody of the neat schoolgirl who had entered the study, her striped tie undone, long dark hair unkempt across her face, knickers hanging round her ankles, her face bowed in profound shame and mortification.

As if reading her thoughts the Headmistress commanded: ‘Remove your knickers completely, Worsley.’

‘Yes, Miss Faversham,’ Georgina answered weakly, kicking off her navy knickers leaving the crumpled garment rather pathetically on the carpet, her last slight hope of protection gone.

Her legs felt like jelly but she managed to walk stiffly across the study. She stood close to the edge of the desk and leant painfully forward across the top holding the further edge of the desk with her hands; a perfect target. The desk-top was hard and uncomfortable beneath her aching ribs as she turned her head slightly to look imploringly at her formidable tormentor, tears trickling down her cheeks, her breath coming in whimpers.

The Headmistress flexed a long, fearful cane as if transfixed by the pliant power she held between her hands. She walked around the desk and positioned herself with legs apart, a carefully measured distance from the sobbing schoolgirl. Her left hand smoothed down the navy-blue gymslip and lingered on the curve of the chastised bottom beneath. Then she folded the garment over to reveal the hot blotched buttocks and thighs separated by her shiny bush of dense, dark hair.

Miss Faversham held the cane just above the centre of those once silky-smooth buttocks which she herself had transformed into flaming mounds. Georgina screwed her eyes up tight, every muscle a vice of tension awaiting the coming onslaught. The moment seemed to go on forever. She heard a church bell ringing away across the Downs. The Headmistress was poised like an Olympic jumper awaiting the perfect moment to launch herself…

Suddenly she jerked the cane high above her head and brought it down with every ounce of her weight in an almighty THWACKKK across the middle of Georgina’s rump!

The girl shrieked out in agony and shock, her legs kicking up automatically as a merciless shower of mighty whacks followed in unbelievably quick succession. Her bum wriggled frantically in a futile attempt to escape the flashing cane which scorched her buttocks with an anger rare even in Miss Faversham. Her whole rump was blazing under its furious, stinging lashes. Wincing and gritting her teeth desperately at the ever-increasing pain, her head swam and she wondered if she would faint. Her buttocks which had previously been thoroughly red-blotched were now striped with almost mathematical precision by rising red ridges and crimson weals down to the tops of her thighs.

‘YEOWWWW!’ she howled over and over again, her cries echoing around the wails. Georgie wept her heart out as the Head thrashed down stroke after stroke as if possessed by some superpotent force. The deafening THWACKs mingled with her howls, shrieks and screams, her buttocks vainly squirming, legs kicking wildly after each new whipping blow…

Then as if by some divine intervention there was a firm knock at the door. Miss Faversham paused, collected herself and answered in her cultured tones:

‘I am engaged at present, who is it?’

A Scottish voice replied, ‘Begging your pardon Headmistress, Lady Fairfax has arrived and is looking over the library.’

‘Very well, Matron,’ she called out. ‘I will join her directly.’

Miss Faversham set aside her cane, calmed herself and adjusted her suit and hair. Lady Fairfax was a wealthy old girl and an important benefactor of St Elia’s.

She turned to the pathetic figure of Georgie crying loudly across the desk too frightened to move. The Head uttered the commanding words ‘You are now dismissed, Worsley’ and strode purposefully from the room.

----//----

The next afternoon Penny found herself hard at work in the School Captain’s Study. She was thoroughly miserable, her expulsion plan just wasn’t working.

What a term she thought to herself! It was only Wednesday and already she’d been thrashed, gated, and to cap it all now she was down on her knees with a dustpan sweeping up for Eleanor Burns in the undignified role of fag — a position normally filled by much younger junior girls, and only very rarely awarded to a senior as a humiliating punishment. Added to that, because of her, poor Georgina had been severely thrashed and was even now in the dorm trying vainly to soothe her blazing bottom.

Things couldn’t get much worse!

Penny got to her feet and began dusting off the bookshelves. She stretched awkwardly to reach the top shelf, lost balance and down came half-a-dozen books in a heap on the floor.

‘Oh hell!’ she yelled, hoping Eleanor didn’t come in.

She began putting the books back when out of a diary dropped a pink envelope. On the front was written To Darling Eleanor. What a laugh Penny thought! Some steamy love letter from one of Eleanor’s boyfriends! Listening carefully for footsteps outside in the corridor she slipped the letter out and unfolded it. Her sly smile of amusement changed to a look of astonishment as she read on.

It was a steamy love letter all right, but it was from Rosamund Grant!

As the truth dawned on Penny other thoughts ran through her mind. She folded the letter back into the envelope and put it in her pocket, quickly finished her tasks in a preoccupied mood and made her way back to the dorm. She was walking on air. Being expelled suddenly seemed unimportant. The letter could change everything.

Georgie was lying on her bed on her tummy reading a girl’s magazine and wincing noticeably as she changed position. Penny sat on the edge of her bed in a state of some excitement.

‘Georgie, you won’t believe what I’ve found!’ she cried.

Georgina was much too keenly aware of her red raw buttocks still throbbing and immensely tender from yesterday’s thrashing to raise much enthusiasm. However, as she read the letter which Penny handed over her expression changed to one of amazement.

‘Gosh!’ she exclaimed. ‘I knew they were close friends but this is pretty strong stuff!’

‘You’re not kidding,’ Penny agreed. She took the letter and read out in a mock romantic voice: ‘I long for the touch of your ripe young breasts.’

They both burst into peals of laughter! Then Penny grew more serious.

‘The thing is, Georgie, this is our chance to settle scores with those two little tyrants, isn’t it?’

Georgie’s expression changed too. She hadn’t seen that side of it.

‘You don’t mean…’ she began.

‘I mean this letter’s going straight under Miss Faversham’s door while everyone’s at supper,’ she said clearly and with determination.

‘Crikey,’ Georgie said. This was going to make some waves!

----//----

The next morning Miss Faversham’s face bore a concerned expression as she sat behind her desk re-reading the pink letter which had appeared under her door the previous evening. This was a serious matter and she had called on Matron for a discussion.

‘There’s the reputation of the school to think of, Headmistress,’ Matron reminded her.

Miss Faversham realised this. If two such senior girls were expelled the Press would get hold of it. In short there would be a dreadful scandal. On the other hand something of this sort could not possibly go unpunished…

In the corridor outside, Eleanor and Rosamund stood before the oak door. They were often summoned to the Head for routine matters and chatted confidently as they waited for the conversation barely audible in the study to finish. They made a delightful picture in their striped blazers and ties, short blue pleated skirts, black nylons and high heels, Eleanor’s long brown hair contrasting with the auburn curls of Rosamund.

‘Enter!’ the Head’s voice rang out with unusual sternness.

The two girls filed in. Both had hardly been off the sports field this week and their beautiful young faces gleamed with health. Eleanor wondered if the atmosphere wasn’t a little tense when her eyes ran along the empty desk-top.

Suddenly her heart stopped there was that letter!

‘God!’ she said aloud despite herself, hardly believing what she was seeing.

Rosamund looked at her, followed the line of her gaze and saw the letter with horror, blushing the deepest shade of crimson. They were both visibly trembling with the shock.

‘It has come to my attention that a serious impropriety has occurred,’ Miss Faversham announced gravely with a glance towards the letter sitting alone on the cleared desk-top.

The two senior girls gazed down at the carpet with their heads hung in exquisite shame so unlike their customary self-consciousness of prestige and pride.

‘Yes, Miss Faversham,’ they answered in unison barely audible.

‘Quite clearly you should both be expelled,’ the Head continued matter-of-factly.

The girls reeled as this hammer blow destroyed their worlds at a stroke. Reputations, careers, future, everything would be gone…

Miss Faversham paused, allowing them to take in the full implications. They stood there dumbstruck in their awful mental suffering.

‘However,’ she eventually added, ‘with the reputation of St Elia’s in mind I am prepared to forget this unsavoury incident provided you both submit to a sound thrashing and guarantee that nothing of this sort will ever occur again.’ Her eyes gleamed.

The girls’ confused, agonised minds staggered under this new revelation! They, who wielded a fierce authority over the whole school, could now only escape the horror of public expulsion by submitting to physical punishment on their own persons! They could hardly take it in. But they had no real choice.

‘Yes, Miss Faversham,’ they replied weakly in unison indicating their acceptance.

‘You will position yourselves side by side across the desk,’ the Headmistress commanded stridently.

‘Yes, Miss Faversham.’

They slowly stepped forward to the desk, their long slender legs trembling, and leant forward with their chins and hands on the far edge, their short pleated skirts riding up and revealing black suspenders on creamy white thighs.

Eleanor’s mind reeled. She, the School Captain, lying across the desk with her bottom stuck up! It just couldn’t be happening…

Miss Faversham vigorously flexed a long, thin cane with a dark expression on her animated face as Matron stepped forward and folded up the girls’ navy skirts. Side by side, their long beautiful legs in black-seamed nylons and their exquisitely curved buttocks in delicious underwear, the two young women were a rare sight indeed.

Eleanor wore pink satin French knickers with white lace trimming, Rosamund lemon-yellow briefs with tiers of white, lacy frills. Matron duly pulled these delightful garments down over the girls’ suspenders to their trembling knees.

Oh no! Rosamund thought, not expecting this extreme indignity as well. Both girls blushed deep crimson as their gorgeous naked rumps were fully exposed to the gaze of the Matron and Headmistress.

Matron slowly unclasped her blue leather belt. She folded it double, grasped it firmly in her natural left hand and stood waiting slightly to the right of Rosamund. On the Prefect’s left, Eleanor held herself tense for the unbelievable onslaught to begin. Slightly to her left the Headmistress stood poised with a long thin cane held high above her head.

Suddenly the cane screamed through the air and landed squarely across the centre of Eleanor’s rump with a tremendous THWACKKK!

She shrieked out, gasping with sudden shock and pain. She had forgotten it could sting so terribly, she was more used to handing out beatings.

At the same moment Matron lashed the thick leather belt down with all her strength right across Rosamund’s trembling buttocks. She screamed as the intensely stinging blow was instantly followed by a blistering series of lashes on the same rapidly reddening band of flesh. It was years since she had felt anything like this and she couldn’t believe the pain. Her nerves screamed out with the incredible stinging of the furious leather which Matron rained down on her with vicious powerful swings from high above her head. IT WAS UNBEARABLE!

Next to her Eleanor’s bottom squirmed and wriggled madly under the whipping strokes of the cane, into each and every one of which Miss Faversham put every ounce of her strength. A series of lurid scarlet stripes blazed across the hot twin cheeks. Eleanor’s face winced grotesquely from the incredible agony of the pain. Her whole body contorted with stress. She gasped out as each savage stroke bit deep into the naked flesh of her buttocks, howling out her anguish despite herself as each new stroke hit home.

Rosamund’s buttocks were now cherry red and burning with pain under the lashing strap. Her pitiful shrieks filled the entire study.

Suddenly the shock, the pain, the humiliation of it all were too much for Rosamund and despite her age she burst helplessly into floods of tears and wails as Matron intensified the merciless bombardment, now deeply absorbed in her task.

Beside her Eleanor bit her lip desperately, feeling Rosamund’s despair as well as her own as the searing cane slashed repeatedly into her incandescent buttocks, her lovely legs now kicking up wildly after every excruciating stroke, her bruised ribs aching and squirming on the rock-hard desk-top. After each awful stroke she helplessly howled out her pain. Her piercing yells mingled with Rosamund’s shrieks and moans in a frightful cacophony of suffering.

The sobbing girls were now lost in realms of unfathomable torment. All hope and control gone, they had long since abandoned themselves to their horrendous suffering, sobbing and wailing and shrieking in helpless submission to the devastating attack.

But at last it was over. They could hardly take it in.

The two girls stood up slowly and painfully, faces streaked with tears and perspiration and red with pain and shame.

The Headmistress and Matron stood imperiously with strong, unrelenting expressions on their proud faces.

‘You are now dismissed and this matter is closed,’ Miss Faversham announced curtly as the girls stiffly walked out of the study, heads bowed in unspeakable shame.

Hours later at Evensong Penny and Georgie watched keenly as the staff and prefects assembled on the platform. Both Eleanor Burns and Rosamund Grant looked distinctly red-eyed! Eleanor read the lesson as usual but when she sat down she winced visibly and even uttered an audible squeal!

Penny and Georgie looked at each other with irrepressible smiles.

Perhaps the new term was beginning to look up after all!