Thank you, Mr Whacker

The following is an extract from the diary of Penelope Hasler, a Fifth Form pupil at Birchington School for Girls.

Friday 24 Feb

I went to see Mr Whacker as instructed this afternoon, and my poor little bottom is now very sore as a result.

This whole week I have wished and wished that somehow Friday wouldn't come, but of course it did. I could have cried when I awoke this morning. And I have spent the most miserable day in school, for I have known each and every moment that a thrashing lay in store at four o'clock. Of course my thoughts being elsewhere during classes led to trouble: I was given a harsh telling-off in Needlework, six with the slipper in History, and was sent to sit in the corner in French.

On my long bicycle ride to Whackenham, I seriously thought about absconding – simply running away, from my punishment, from school, from everything – but then I thought about the trouble I would be in when I was inevitably found, and I thought better of it.

Once arrived I was escorted to Mr Whacker's office by a girl who was younger than me; she was perhaps a Second Year. She smiled cruelly when I said I was there to see the Headmaster, and she seemed to take great pleasure in leading me to my fate along the dark corridors of the school. "Don't dawdle, Hasler!" she scolded at one point, much to my embarrassment. A Second Year, speaking to me in that manner! But I didn't dare answer back, for fear that she might land me in further trouble out of spite.

And then we were suddenly at the Headmaster's door. I took a deep breath and knocked, then timidly crept round the door when commanded to enter.

"I am pleased to see you here on time, Miss Hasler," said Mr Whacker. "Were you late, you would have been very sorry for it. Now come here."

I stood in front of Mr Whacker's desk and was given a long, stern lecture. I was told that I was a hooligan; a disgrace. I was told that my antics were inexcusable. I was told that I would have to buck my ideas up or I would never amount to anything but a very foolish, very wicked little girl. I was crying by the end.

And then it was time for my first punishment. Six strokes of the cane, three on each hand. I hate being thrashed on the hand, and I had to summon every ounce of courage I possessed in order to hold my hands out in turn. The junior cane was applied, hard, and I yelped in pain with each stroke. Once all six had been delivered I whimpered a little "Thank you, Sir," and coddled my stinging palms sadly.

"I trust that you will think twice before stealing again, girl?" Mr Whacker asked, flexing his cane with satisfaction.

"Y-yes, Sir!"

Next was the strap. I had known since receiving Mr Whacker's reply to my confessional letter that I would have to raise my skirt and bend over for this punishment. Yet when the moment arrived I was hesitant to do so, not only because I knew that the feared leather would be applied to my bottom when I did, but also because I was overcome with a kind of shy trepidation. After all, I didn't lift my skirt and show my knickers off to strange men all that often, and the prospect frightened me a little. "Please, Sir," I whispered, "Must I raise my skirt?"

"Yes, Penny, you must. Now be a good girl and do as I say."

Mr Whacker's voice, calm and commanding, washed my hesitancy away. My trepidation, however, remained. But I obediently lifted my skirt and bent over, gripping my ankles tightly. My hair fell down round my face, as one further reminder of my predicament.

"Good girl," Mr Whacker said. "And I am pleased to see you have regulation knickers on. Now, you will retain that position until I give you permission to stand. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Sir," I whispered. Mr Whacker patted the strap against his palm a couple of times. I held my breath. The next moment the strap cracked against my bottom with an awful SMACK!

I knew full well that I had been instructed to stay in position, but I simply couldn't help leaping up and reaching back to rub the soreness better. Mr Whacker was, of course, very cross with me, and he pushed me firmly back down into position. "BEND OVER, GIRL! You really are a mischievous girl, and you're going to be VERY sorry you disobeyed me!"

And with that he took the strap to me with vigour, slapping it against my rear with agonising force and rapidity.

SMACK! SMACK! SMACK! SMACK! SMACK!

I got twelve frightful swats, in addition to the first that had been discounted. I howled with pain at each one but remained bent over until I was told to stand, and did not dare rub my bottom despite its soreness. I simply thanked Mr Whacker once more and gazed meekly down at my shoes.

"Now, Miss Hasler," the strict Headmaster said, pacing across the room as if to retrieve something. "It is time for your third and final punishment. The birch."

Oh... not the birch! And I was to get it on the bare! "Oh, but Sir!" I pleaded, a look of pitiful desperation on my face. "Not another word, young lady!" came the stern rebuke. "You will take your punishment well, or you will receive extra. Now remove your skirt and knickers, and place them neatly on that chair."

My heart sank as I realised that I had no choice. I looked up at Mr Whacker appealingly one last time, in a silent plea for clemency, and began to unfasten my skirt. I removed it, then folded it neatly and put it on the chair as instructed. Then I eased my blue school knickers down my legs, timidly stepped out of them, and placed them on top of my skirt. Naked from the waist down, I felt so exposed, so vulnerable, and so very sorry for being naughty. And then I gasped, and instinctively covered myself with my hands, when the door opened and a man entered.

"Ah, Mr Groves," said Mr Whacker. "Right on time. Now, if you would like to take your place behind my desk?"

I blushed furiously as the middle-aged, stocky groundskeeper walked past me and took up his position. And then Mr Whacker turned to me. "Now, Miss Hasler, you will bend over my desk."

I didn't want to, of course, but I knew that I had no choice. I shuffled to the large oak desk, and bent down over it. Mr Groves placed his big, rough hands over my wrists. I felt so unutterably helpless and trapped.

I trembled when Mr Whacker swished the birch rod through the air. "You will receive exactly thirty-six strokes, Penelope," he said. "You do not have to count them. Now, are you ready?"

"Yes, Sir," I whispered.

For a moment I could feel my heart beating against my breast, and its thump was the only sound in the room. And then I heard the terrible SWISH! of the birch through the air, and felt its scorch on my defenceless cheeks. It stung so terribly! "Oww!" I wailed.

SWISH! "Oww!"
SWISH! "OWW!"

Again and again the birch struck me, each successive stroke making the fire that raged in my behind more excruciating; more impossibly unbearable. I howled and danced, and struggled with all my might against the groundskeeper's firm grasp, but I was held firm and those frightful twigs returned to lash me with unerring, merciless repetition. All I knew was pain and regret – damn that awful, awful birch! Long before the last stroke, my howls had become mere islands in an ocean of tears.

And then, at last, it was over. Mr Groves relinquished his hold on my wrists, but I simply remained limp over the desk, sobbing uncontrollably. I didn't even hear him leave the room.

Some time later, Mr Whacker told me to stand up and put my knickers and skirt back on. I tearfully and painfully obeyed, and, through my tears, thanked him for disciplining me.

"I only hope that your punishment teaches you a badly needed lesson, Penelope," he said, sitting back at his desk once more. He looked and sounded the epitome of calm authority. I looked, and felt, a disheveled, chastised wretch. How my bottom burned!

Once Mr Whacker had dismissed me I was shown out of the school by the same girl who had escorted me to my appointment. She wore an even more insufferably superior expression than before, which made me think she had been listening to my ordeal at the door, and which made me feel like quite the silliest little schoolgirl in the world. "Thank you," I said when she had deposited me at the entrance foyer. "Thank you... what?" she surprisingly prompted, fixing me with a stern, expectant glare. "Thank you... Miss," I gulped, lowering my head instinctively in humiliation. "That's better!" she grinned. "Now wait here for your teacher like a good little girl."

"Yes, Miss," I tearfully answered.

I was driven back to school by Miss Porter, the Head of Year. I sobbed and sniffled the whole journey, squirming in discomfort, feeling very sorry for myself and desperate for sympathy. But my strict teacher simply told me to sit still and be quiet. "If you don't stop making such a fuss, Penny, I'll pull over and give you something to cry about!" she scolded. "Yes, M-Miss," I whimpered in reply.

On reaching Birchington I wanted nothing more than to run to my bed and cry my eyes out and soothe my poor, aching rear. But, of course, I had my nightly detention so I had instead to hurry to Room 7A. I felt so lonely, and so very wretched, sitting at that horrid desk writing "My behaviour on Saturday, February 11th was inexcusable and I shall never, ever repeat it" over and over and over. Sitting was dreadfully uncomfortable – those stupid wooden chairs are so unforgivingly hard – but I had no choice but to stay, and to write, in dismal, monotonous silence, until all thousand lines were written. I will freely admit that fitful tears trickled down my face, wetting my exercise paper, the entire time.

And now, finally, I am back in the dorm, lying on my front (with my knickers round my knees, lotion and cool air doing their best to soothe my ravaged skin) and wishing I had never had that silly, naughty impulse to steal an apple.