A time for reflection

By Claris­sa

It was a task she had got used to over the years: the end-of-term review of the Pun­ish­ment Book. In fact, it was the last task she com­plet­ed before writ­ing the girls’ reports.

Miss Sven­son leant down and retrieved a leather-bound book from a bot­tom draw­er of her desk. “Here we go again” she thought to her­self as she thumbed through the entries. Here was the cat­a­logue of pun­ish­ments, and mis­de­meanours. Here were the slip­per­ings, the strap­pings, the junior and senior can­ings; here the hand spank­ings and, on occa­sion, the dress­ings downs. Here were the records of inso­lence, smok­ing and going out-of-bounds. Here were details of names, and forms.

Look­ing through the book, she was pleased to note that, for the most part, pupils had not reof­fend­ed. Of course, there were always excep­tions: Miran­da Spears sprang imme­di­ate­ly to mind.

Miss Sven­son closed the book and picked up a file that was sit­ting on her blot­ter: here were the lines and essays she had set as pun­ish­ment dur­ing term. She leafed care­ful­ly through until she came to a thin sheaf of blue paper, pinned with a paper clip. She slipped off the clip and start­ed to read:

‘The Mean­ing of Humil­i­a­tion’ by Miran­da Spears, Upper V

 Humil­i­a­tion is about pow­er, and con­trol. Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, humil­i­a­tion is inflict­ed by those in a posi­tion of author­i­ty upon those in a less­er posi­tion: so the teacher to the school girl, the police­man to the scal­ly­wag, the mas­ter to the ser­vant. Of course, this is not always the case. The school girl can humil­i­ate the teacher, even per­haps if this was not her inten­tion: if the teacher feels humil­i­at­ed, then she is, and the action of the school girl is wrong. 

But is inflict­ing humil­i­a­tion always wrong, or is moral rel­a­tivism at work? The teacher, for exam­ple, will argue that humil­i­at­ing the school girl is for her own good, and will pro­vide some sort of ‘les­son’. That insist­ing a girl bends over, expos­ing her some­times bared bot­tom, and sub­mit­ting to a dose of the strap or the cane with­out recourse to com­plaint will nec­es­sar­i­ly improve her behav­iour. Or will it just inspire resentment?

Miss Sven­son pinned the papers hur­ried­ly back togeth­er and rein­sert­ed them in the file. The spurt of anger she had felt when she had first read the essay came back to her: how dare the girl call into ques­tion her meth­ods – it was more than inso­lent. She had thought about bring­ing her in for a firm talk­ing to, at the very least. But then she had thought bet­ter of it: the essay was well writ­ten and rea­soned, and had been sub­mit­ted on time. Miss Sven­son shook her head, then looked down at her hands; the hands that had inflict­ed so many spank­ings on naughty girls’ bot­toms. She then retrieved a small com­pact mir­ror from the desk and looked for a moment at her face: no, she had no doubt, her meth­ods and moti­va­tions were sound; still, she sup­posed, it didn’t hurt to check once in a while.

No Laugh­ing Matter

By Claris­sa

She could hear the hub­bub from halfway down the cor­ri­dor – a groundswell of noise punc­tu­at­ed by the occa­sion­al peal of out­right laugh­ter. It was of course com­ing from Miss Har­g­reaves’ Latin class. Miss Har­g­reaves was new to the school, in fact new to teach­ing, and her lack of class­room con­trol had been the talk of the staffroom for weeks. Despite her out­stand­ing aca­d­e­m­ic ref­er­ences, it seemed she could not han­dle the class­room sit­u­a­tion – well, one class in par­tic­u­lar, and one girl.

Miss Sven­son lis­tened at the class­room door a few moments: she heard a few muf­fled nois­es then an abrupt ‘Sit down at once!’ from Miss Har­g­reaves, fol­lowed by a pause then anoth­er peal of rau­cous laugh­ter. Miss Sven­son pushed opened the door and stepped swift­ly into the class­room – a stiff silence fell instant­ly on pro­ceed­ings. One look at a flushed and dis­tressed Miss Har­g­reaves, and a tall blonde girl still stand­ing, said it all. Miss Sven­son threw a fero­cious glance around the room then barked ‘Miran­da Spears, fol­low me!’ Miss Sven­son turned on her heel as the tall blonde girl made her way slow­ly out of the class. Miss Sven­son kept ahead of the girl, past the geog­ra­phy room, the his­to­ry room, down the main stairs with their gleam­ing mar­ble balustrades, along anoth­er cor­ri­dor to a fine oak door marked ‘Head­mistress’ in shiny brass let­ters. Miss Sven­son entered her study, keep­ing the door ajar, and wait­ed for the school­girl. Against her bet­ter judge­ment, she was furi­ous – she knew she shouldn’t take this out on the girl (even though she had had to deal with her before) but it would be dif­fi­cult. After a few moments Miran­da Spears appeared at the door. ‘Come in’ boomed Miss Sven­son. The girl entered and stood silent­ly in front of the Head. Miss Sven­son didn’t look up imme­di­ate­ly, try­ing hard to com­pose her feel­ings. After a short while, ‘Do you have any­thing to say?’ The girl didn’t respond. Miss Sven­son stood up – ‘I am going to give you six strokes of the cane, but I want you to know I will repeat the stroke if you don’t respond to me dur­ing the pun­ish­ment – do you understand?’

The girl looked a lit­tle non­plussed, but didn’t reply. ‘You’ve been here before,’ con­tin­ued Miss Sven­son, ‘assume the posi­tion!’ The girl took off her blaz­er and bent her body care­ful­ly over Miss Svenson’s pol­ished wal­nut desk. Miss Sven­son pulled back the girl’s blue pleat­ed skirt then made her way to the cor­ner cup­board, from which she pro­duced a long, crook-han­dled cane. A few prac­tice swish­es then wham, down on the girl’s exposed behind. ‘Do you think it’s fun­ny to humil­i­ate peo­ple?’ she demand­ed; no reply from the girl. Down came the cane again, and again, the same ques­tion. Still no response. The cane again, then a sti­fled ‘please’. ‘Please what?’ demand­ed Miss Sven­son. No response. The cane again, this time hard­er than ever – ‘Do you think it’s fun­ny to humil­i­ate peo­ple?’ This time Miss Sven­son paused; she could already see the can­ing had inflict­ed some seri­ous marks and, although angry, she did not wish to thrash the girl with­in an inch of her life. She raised the cane again; then heard a qui­et ‘No’. ‘No what?’ demand­ed Miss Sven­son. ‘No, I don’t think it’s fun­ny to humil­i­ate peo­ple’ from the girl. The cane again – five strokes now. The girl gasped then buried her head in her arm. ‘So you will apol­o­gise to Miss Har­g­reaves?’ the cane one more time, and anoth­er gasp from the girl, fol­lowed by a muf­fled ‘Yes.’ Miss Sven­son looked at the girl, her head was still buried in her arm, her behind, although obscured by her knick­ers, still revealed the tell-tale ridges of a good hard can­ing. ‘Get up and adjust your dress’ com­mand­ed Miss Sven­son. The girl got up, and pulled down her skirt. ‘Face me’ con­tin­ued Miss Sven­son. The girl turned round – her hair was dishev­elled and, for the very first time, she looked on the verge of tears. Miss Sven­son couldn’t help smil­ing to her­self at this; after all, it was no laugh­ing matter.

Late

by

Claris­sa

Late again, yes, she knew she was late again; and it was for dou­ble maths, with Miss Prim. She was bound to get a tongue-lash­ing at least, she thought to her­self, as she laboured up the school dri­ve and start­ed across the rose gar­den. She glanced at her watch: five min­utes late had become ten, and she still hadn’t reached the block. She sighed, find­ing her­self flop­ping down on one of the orna­men­tal seats that lined the path. The ros­es were in full bloom: whites, yel­lows and the occa­sion­al splash of flam­ing crim­son; it was a beau­ti­ful sight. Twelve min­utes late now. What was she to do? If she wasn’t going (which, she realised now, she wasn’t) her best hope was that Prim wouldn’t miss her. Was that pos­si­ble? Or maybe she could pre­tend she had been sick? But for that you need­ed to go and see Matron, and that wasn’t going to happen.

She stood up: she had bet­ter get her­self out of sight, she thought; it would be too bad to be caught by a teacher or sixth-for­mer now.  She head­ed across to the main school build­ing, then up the back stairs to the old art room, right at the very top. No one went there now – in fact, strict­ly, it was out-of-bounds.

She looked around the art room – what had once been a hive of activ­i­ty had now fall­en silent; dreams and ambi­tions cov­ered in dust sheets. She paced the floor­boards, rehears­ing pos­si­ble excus­es in her mind, the clock tick­ing relent­less­ly on. She looked again at her watch – quar­ter to one. Gina and Emma would be out of lunch now for sure; maybe she should go and see them?

She found them near the hock­ey pitch. ‘Hey,’ she said, ‘how’s things?’

‘Where the heck have you been?’ demand­ed Gina cross­ly, though her expres­sion denot­ed relief.

‘Just out and about,’ said Roz; ‘how was maths?’

‘Ter­ri­ble as usu­al,’ respond­ed Emma.

‘Did Prim miss me?’

‘She did ask if any­one knew where you were,’ con­tin­ued Emma, ‘and we said “No”.’

‘That was it?’

‘Yup.’

After­noon French went pret­ty much as usu­al: Roz enjoyed read­ing du Mau­pas­sant, and liked Made­moi­selle; she start­ed to for­get about what had hap­pened in the morn­ing. As the clock approached half three, how­ev­er, her stom­ach start­ed to tighten.

There was the bell; she was so close now. She grabbed her bag and made for the door.

‘One moment please, Ros­alind’; it was the voice of Mademoiselle.

She stopped in her tracks and turned round, as her friends filed past her.

‘Miss Prim wants to see you,’ con­tin­ued Mademoiselle.

‘What, now?’ said Roz.

‘Yes, now please,’ said Mademoiselle.

Roz sim­ply nodded.

Miss Prim was a woman in her thir­ties, but she dressed like a six­ty-some­thing librar­i­an – Prim by name, Prim by nature, thought Roz.

‘Why weren’t you in class today, Ros­alind?’ demand­ed Miss Prim, sur­vey­ing the school­girl with pierc­ing blue eyes.

Roz had of course antic­i­pat­ed this ques­tion; but her mind drew a blank.

‘Were you sick?’ con­tin­ued Prim.

Here was her chance; she could pre­tend she had been silent­ly retch­ing behind the bike sheds, but no, she couldn’t do it.

‘No.’

‘So?’

‘I’m afraid I was late,’ blurt­ed out Roz.

‘So you thought if you didn’t come at all maybe I wouldn’t notice – is that it?’

‘Yes,’ con­tin­ued Roz, then ‘sor­ry.’

‘Well,’ con­tin­ued Prim, ‘you have been a very fool­ish girl.’ Roz dropped her gaze.

‘If you had been late, I would of course not been very pleased,’ con­tin­ued Prim, ‘but,’ and now Roz felt her eyes burn­ing into her, ‘I would have dealt with it myself.’ A slight pause.

‘How­ev­er, as you have cho­sen to miss a les­son – and a dou­ble les­son at that – I have no choice but to send you to Miss Svenson.’

Roz’s stom­ach hit the floor; sure­ly not the head­mistress – that could only mean one thing, and it was not good.

‘Please,’ she found her­self say­ing, ‘I won’t do it again,’ and now hot tears start­ed spilling uncon­trol­lably down her cheeks.

‘I’m sor­ry,’ con­tin­ued Miss Prim, ‘but Miss Sven­son is already expect­ing you: I’m afraid it’s just too late.’

A dif­fi­cult customer

by

Claris­sa

She didn’t enjoy using the cane, Miss Sven­son remind­ed her­self as she stood at the study win­dow, watch­ing the rain­drops course down the goth­ic arch­es. No, for her, the cane was the weapon of last resort; the weapon you used when all oth­er sanc­tions – tellings off, lines, stand­ings, nose to the wall in the cor­ner, had not worked. Still, when she did use it, she intend­ed to make it hurt. After all, this was for the good of the girls: this was not just about pun­ish­ing past bad behav­iour, this was about encour­ag­ing future good behav­iour, even if this was accom­plished through fear. And most­ly it worked; most­ly, girls would leave her study, tears flow­ing hot­ly, and promis­ing not to come to her atten­tion again. But, and she sighed, this was not always the case: there was some­times what she referred to as ‘dif­fi­cult customers’.

She turned from the win­dow and sat back at her desk, upon which sat the file of fifth for­mer Miran­da Spears. She opened the file, the wind now howl­ing incon­solably out­side, and took out the note from Miss Thom­son: ‘Dear Elsa, I would be grate­ful if you could deal with Miran­da Spears. As you know, she has a gen­er­al inso­lent atti­tude towards staff, but this morn­ing her insub­or­di­na­tion reached new heights when she refused point blank to com­plete her lines. I would be very grate­ful if you could deal with her severe­ly. Yours exas­per­at­ed, Helen.’

‘Exas­per­at­ed’ was a heavy word, and ‘severe­ly’ left no doubt in her mind that Miss Thom­son was call­ing for the cane. And so it would be. Here came the knock.

‘Come in,’ boomed Miss Svenson.

A tall, blonde-head­ed girl walked in and stood before her desk.

‘I won’t take long over this,’ Miss Sven­son con­tin­ued, ‘as I’m sure you know why you are here.’

No response from the schoolgirl.

‘This lev­el of insub­or­di­na­tion is not to be tol­er­at­ed: do you understand?’

Still no response.

‘And it’s not the first time you have come to my atten­tion,’ Miss Sven­son now remov­ing a sheet of paper from the file. ‘I had hoped you had learned your les­son from last time.’

Still no response, not even a waiv­er from the school­girl. Miss Sven­son stood up.

‘Take off your blaz­er off and bend over the desk; I am going to give you six strokes of the cane – and I intend it to hurt very much.’

With­out a mur­mur the school­girl removed her blaz­er, hung it over the back of the chair by the door, and stretched over the desk.

‘Lift up your skirt,’ – the girl com­plied. ‘Don’t move!’

Miss Sven­son wait­ed a moment, then walked across to the cor­ner cup­board and select­ed her weapon; she had already decid­ed on the senior cane.

She stead­ied her­self, remind­ing her­self that this was a nec­es­sary – though painful – part of her duties as head.

She slammed down the cane, right across the schoolgirl’s blue school knick­ers. A slight jerk and gasp, but noth­ing more from Miran­da. Was she real­ly going to sub­mit to this with­out response?

Anoth­er stroke, then anoth­er in quick suc­ces­sion, allow­ing no time for recov­ery. By the end, Miss Sven­son was slight­ly sweat­ing, but the school­girl remained impas­sive across the desk.

‘Get up, and adjust your skirt.’

Up stood the school­girl, and turned to Miss Svenson.

‘Thank you, Miss Sven­son!’ demand­ed the head.

‘Thank you, Miss Svenson.’

‘Do you have any­thing else to say?’

An apol­o­gy would be nice; but noth­ing came. Still, Miss Sven­son was pleased to note, Miran­da did at least look some­what discomposed.

‘I want 100 lines from you by this time tomor­row young lady, and heav­en help you if you disobey.’

Miss Sven­son looked at the 15-year-old in front of her: ‘”I will not be insub­or­di­nate in class” – 100 lines by tomor­row!’ she went on, although some­where deep inside her she wished they could be ‘I will not be so brave when caned’!