Miss Strang Chapter 2
By Governess
liviaarbuthnot1@gmail.com

Copyright 2008 by Governess, all rights reserved

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This story is intended for ADULTS ONLY. It contains explicit depictions of sexual activity involving minors. If you are not of a legal age in your locality to view such material or if such material does not appeal to you, do not read further, and do not save this story.
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Chapter 2

John lay across Miss Strang's lap, sobbing with great choking sobs, his bottom marked with ten strokes of the hairbrush. His screams of resentment had soon turned to screams of anguish as the smarting pain mastered him; and although through his tears he had implored her to stop, no remission was given. She had given the first strokes to the crown of each buttock and then, alternating from cheek to cheek, had worked down to the tops of his thighs.

She waited allowing him to calm himself and to recover some composure. Then laying aside the brush, placing it upon the floor by the chair, she reached beneath his thin cotton vest, and gently rubbed his smooth back in a comforting manner.

"I hope you have learned your lesson, John. That small boys must at all times obey those set in authority over them. And obeying means doing immediately and without question what is asked of you. But it is more than that. A boy who does what is asked of him, even if it is done instantly, but shows resentment or anger or a sulky disposition is not being truly obedient. Please remember that for the future. Now go and stand facing the wall under the clock. Simon and Livia can be grateful to you for displaying such a well-spanked bottom from which they can both learn the absolute necessity of obedience at all times."

Making a child stand displaying his hot chastised flesh is a refinement of discipline. The visible marks are but the outward sign of an inner chastisement by which the child's will has been forced to prostrate itself before his tormentress. It is this conquering of his will that makes a boy hot and sticky with shame, and by forcing him to display the visible marks of his subjugation, the shame scorches and burns him all the more fiercely.

Miss Strang turned to Simon and myself.

"Well, children, let us see how you performed in the written test of your ability. I have demanded nothing extraordinary and as I warned you there will be a penalty to pay for mistakes and work left undone. Simon bring me your exercise book."

Simon, flushed and anxious, came forward and proffered his book.

"Stand with you hands clasped behind your back, please Simon. That is the way a small boy should stand before his governess."

She took her time going through his additions and subtractions, marking the page as she went with a red pencil. Eventually she looked up, and smiled.

"And how well do you think you have done, Simon," she asked not unkindly.

"I don't know . . . Miss Strang."

"Well, let me tell you, Simon. From the mental arithmetic test I gave you I would have expected much better than this, much better. I can only conclude that you did not give this assignment your full attention and that you have not applied yourself to the task. I intend to correct these failings in a way that I have found invariably brings about an improvement in a boy's performance.

"Take off your shoes and socks and then undress down to your vest, as you saw John do. And take care to fold you clothes carefully and lay them on your desk."

Simon was biting his lip and already I could see tears welling up in his eyes. Although sturdy for his age he was not yet eight. Miss Strang picked up the cane. I stared at it with a deep curiosity for it did not seem over-threatening compared with the hairbrush. Then, Miss Strang gave it a swish through the air, and from the whoosh it made I realised just how startlingly flexible it was. It was pencil thin and I saw immediately how it would cut into a boy's soft bottom flesh. And that with few strokes he would soon be writhing in agony and sobbing his heart up. I looked at Simon now naked and exposed and felt a strange tightening in my chest. How many strokes would he be given, I wondered.

She passed the cane to her left hand and picked up his book and glanced down at it.

"Well Simon, you have failed to attempt five of the sums you had been set, and of those you did attempt, six were wrongly answered. So let us see if you can do the mental arithmetic. If a boy deserves two strokes of the cane for each sum he fails to attempt, and if there are five such sums, how many strokes of the cane is he going to receive? Well, Simon?"

"Please, Miss Strang, I'm sorry."

"I am sure you are, Simon. Small boys are invariably sorry when facing a caning. They always promise improvement and plead that they will do better next time. But in my experience, small boys are best encouraged to do better if they are whipped for their faults and know that they will receive further whippings if they do not correct them.

"Tell me Simon, if I told you that your faults were not serious enough to deserve a whipping and that it didn't matter whether you got your sums right, would you try harder or not? Just think about that please, and answer me."

"I don't think I'd try if it didn't matter . . . Miss Strang."

"Of course, you would not. No small boy would. But arithmetic does matter and the way in which you will know it matters is by being whipped for you mistakes as well as being rewarded for truly excellent work."

She smiled.

"And I hope that we shall see some of that before too long. Indeed I intend that we shall.

"So what was our little mental arithmetic question: if a boy deserves two strokes of the cane for each sum he fails to attempt, and if there are five such sums, how many strokes of the cane is he going to receive?"

I could see from Simon's flushed face, his tears and his hopeless expression that there was little chance that he would be able to answer correctly.

"Please Miss Strang, please . . I don't know . . . please, please don't cane me."

"The reason you don't know, Simon, is because you are not applying yourself."

She turned to me.

"Livia what is the answer?

"Ten strokes of the cane, Miss Strang."

"And one stroke for each of the six sums that were wrong. How many?"

"Another six strokes, Miss Strang,"

"Making a total of?"

"Sixteen strokes, Miss Strang."

As she turned to Simon, I thought surely she isn't going to give him sixteen strokes. And then I felt that in calculating the sentence I had somehow agreed with it and was concurring in it. I looked at Simon but he would not meet my gaze. His head was hung, his face flushed and tear-stained.

"Well, Simon. You heard what Livia said. Sixteen strokes. Have you ever been caned before?"

"No, Miss Strang."

"Then, I am afraid, Simon, it will come as a surprise to you just how painful a caning on a bare bottom can be."

She spoke not unkindly and put her arm around his shoulder, then tousled his hair.

"Go across to the armchair, Simon, and stand facing the right hand arm."

The armchair had been in the schoolroom for many years, and our mother would sometimes sit there with one of us, sometimes two of us, on her lap. It had well-padded, rounded arms. Simon positioned himself as requested and waited, shivering slightly and looking vulnerable and exposed.

Miss Strang walked across to him holding the cane in her right hand. I remember thinking that although it had a crooked handle she held it just beneath the curve where it straightened out.

"Bend over the arm, please," she said. "Livia will you please come and help Simon to keep his position during the caning. I would expect an older boy to have the self-discipline to do that, but not a boy of Simon's age who is being caned for the first time. Stand facing him on the opposite side of the chair. Simon stretch out both arms so Livia can grasp them. No, Livia, not by his wrists. Hold him higher up just above the elbows. That's right. And hold him firmly, please, as he is going to find it very difficult not to writhe around."

I confess I felt a flush of importance as being given this responsibility. The sycophancy lurking within every child asserted itself and I glowed inwardly at this mark of favour that singled me out as more grown up than my two brothers. At the same time I felt a strange inner excitement. I am sure Miss Strang saw this in my face, as I restrained Simon and waited for the first stroke to cut across his bottom. I swallowed compulsively.

"Livia, will you please ruck Simon's vest further up his back. No, right up the back, please. That's better."

She paused, surveying his soft firm flesh, letting him anticipate the first stroke. She tapped his bottom with the cane and he gave an anxious twitch. He tried to clench his buttocks but found that bent over the arm this was not possible. I noticed that his eyes were closed as though he were trying to escape from the grim reality of his world into a small dark hiding place where small boys could not be caught and caned.

Another slight tap and then the cane was swept up. It seemed to pause for a moment at the top of its rise and then descended in a long sweeping stroke that impacted with a whup across Simon's bare, quivering buttocks. The sound of the impact was, I thought, less impressive than the frightening whooshing noise made on its downward flight.

Simon writhed in agony and gave a long piercing shriek, followed by a loud gasping moaning noise that came from deep inside him. He struggled and tried to pull away from my grasp, but I had no difficulty in restraining him. The instruction to grasp him just above the elbows was well given.

A red weal appeared on his smooth bottom flesh and I looked at it with obviously some visible consternation on my face. How was Simon to endure another fifteen of such strokes? Miss Strang must have seen what I was thinking from my expression.

"Let me assure you Livia that small boys are not delicate little flowers that can be easily trodden under foot. A boy of Simon's age can absorb a great deal of punishment. Yes, it will be painful but it is meant to be. Only in that way will a boy learn the difference between right and wrong, and strive for the right and struggle to avoid the wrong. Afterwards, his bottom will be red and wealed, and he will find it uncomfortably sore for a while. But although the marks remain they will soon cease to hurt. What they will do, is to serve as a reminder to him and to all that see them, that obedience is required of small boys at all times and in all places."

Thereafter, stroke after measured stroke was given, remorselessly and unhurriedly. After the first few strokes, when the full springy power of the cane cut into his small, but fleshy little buttocks, the severity of the discipline was moderated, Miss Strang having regard to his age and his unfamiliarity with such a routine. From about the fourth or fifth stroke, she was content merely to smarten and redden his bottom with little brisk strokes, although I am not sure that Simon appreciated or recognised her leniency at the time. His continuing screams and struggles indicated that he was far from enjoying his first taste of the cane.

(To be continued)