The Making of a Tyrannical Headmaster

An Erotic Short Story

by

Jason Land

PROLOGUE

In early August 19$$, Rufus Rothery sat, for the first time, with a great sense of self-satisfaction, behind the heavy mahogany desk in the Headmaster’s study in the prestigious public school, Frogmore Academy for Boys, located in the large village of Frogmore some ten miles from the city of York in northern England.   Rufus Rothery had just that very day acceded to the post of Headmaster of the hundred year old institution and was looking forward to the start of the new school year in early September.

Rufus Rothery had for the previous five years occupied the post of senior classics master at Rigby College in Lincolnshire. The Headmaster of Rigby had said to him in his final interview before leaving: “As Headmaster of Frogmore, you will be lord of all you survey. You have attained, at the young age of only thirty, a position of seniority in our profession equivalent to mine and I am twice your age.  See that you use your authority wisely and justly.”

Rufus Rothery understood fully the hidden meaning of the message that his old Headmaster had wished convey to him. Both he and his old superior knew that he was leaving Rigby under strained, but unspoken-of circumstances.  But today, sitting behind his magisterial desk, he had already forgotten those words and their significance.  Rufus Rothery was what can best be described as a strict disciplinarian.

More crudely put, he had in his makeup a strong sadistic streak, which manifested itself in his position as a school master in a penchant for beating boys’ naked arses, so much so that he had left both of his two previous teaching positions – and in so doing, had considerably bettered himself, it must be said – under somewhat of a cloud associated with, among other things, his overzealous use of the cane. But now as Headmaster of Frogmore Academy, he was totally free to run the school as he saw best without interference or subtle innuendos from anyone.

The other things mentioned above were associated with the use of his own personal rod – that male appendage found between his legs – for Rufus Rothery was a died-in-the-wool homosexual.  His one redeeming feature was that he never ever importuned any of the boys he was beating. This, in the case of some of the senior boys, who were young men of eighteen or nineteen and who, arse naked, were bent across a chair, required almost unbelievable forbearance on his part.

But to his credit, he reserved his cock for a changing group of sex partners, all of whom were outside the school and all of whom were willing communicants. To his credit, it has to be said that he was as efficient with his cock as he was with the cane and his reputation was second to none..

The word discipline has many meanings, only one of which is applicable in the present case: correction and chastisement.  And to go a little further, both of these words meant the same thing to Rufus Rothery: the vigorous and frequent use of the cane on the naked bottoms of schoolboys’ for the slightest infringement of the rules. And so as he sat for the first time behind that splendid desk in the Headmaster’s study at Frogmore Academy, Rufus Rothery could barely wait for the new term to begin: the new term when, as a new broom, he intended to make a clean sweep of all the bad attitudes which had been allowed to develop in the heads of the boys by his recently retired, superannuated predecessor.

To be fair to the previous Headmaster, he had stayed on well after the normal retirement age to keep the school going through the Great War of 1914-1918 and its aftermath. But age had taken its inevitable toll and manners and discipline had been allowed to run down. That was all now about to change with a vengeance, with the advent of Rufus Rothery as Headmaster.

CHAPTER 1

Rufus Adam Rothery, to give him his full name, was the only son and part namesake of his father, Rufus Jonathan Rothery, a very successful London stockbroker and his wife, Lady Millicent de Gore, daughter of some minor lord.  Coming from a very rich background and being the only son of the union Rufus was given – perhaps better said, was subjected to – what was considered the best education possible for boys of his privileged background.

Living in a large house in Kensington in the late nineteenth century, as the family then did, he and his only sister were looked after by a nanny and attended an exclusive, primary day-school to which they were taken and from which they were brought home each day by the said nanny.  As was often the case with children of upper class families, who see their parents but briefly each day, it was she who became a sort of surrogate mother to Rufus and his sister. Not surprisingly, he loved her dearly: a love which was, of course, reciprocated. In her eyes he could do no wrong, whereas, in fact, from his earliest days,  he was a disobedient and wilfully naughty child.

It is probably safe to say, that his nanny was the only person of either sex that Rufus Rothery ever truly loved in his life. For as we shall see, given his yet-to-be-declared sexual proclivities, members of the opposite sex never attracted him. Even in his adult life, his one permanent partner – another man of course – and he enjoyed what can but be described as a purely physical sexual relationship, into which, intensely physical though it remained, love did not enter at all. But we are getting ahead of ourselves as all that is in the distant future

As was the custom in upper class families, what comfortable home life Rufus had hitherto enjoyed cared for by his nanny came to an abrupt end when, at the age of eight, he was sent off to an exclusive school: St. Olaf’s Preparatory School for Boys. There he took  the first step in his education that would not end until some ten years later, when aged nineteen, he left the boys’ public  school, St. Olaf’s College, to go on to Oxford to read classics. 

His father himself took him by train for his induction into the prep-school.  Whatever had possessed his parents to choose the St. Olaf duo for their only son’s education is a mystery. The two schools were both located near Kendal in the Lake District, which to say the least, were not exactly within easy reach of London. 

But among the smaller public schools, St. Olaf’s College, had a stellar reputation for academic success and regularly sent the majority of its sixth formers to either Oxford or Cambridge or launched them into a career in the upper echelons of the British Civil Service.

But more importantly – possibly most importantly, in the eyes of his father – both schools had the reputation for rigidly enforced strict discipline. Any boy stepping out of line was quickly beaten back into it by regular and vigorous use of the cane. Spare the rod and spoil the boy is a well known aphorism. Well let it be said here and now, that in both the St. Olaf institutions, the rod was never spared; nor were the arses of the lads’ on which the dreaded rod had an uncanny habit of descending.

Rufus Rothery had wept bitterly when he was told that life as he had hitherto known it, comfortable, cosseted and protected by by his nanny, was to come to an end. But even more disconcerting than being plucked from his home life, was the fact that, in his presence, his father had said to Mr Roberts, the prep-school Headmaster, that his son, Rufus, had a mischievously rebellious streak in his character and that, if merited, the Headmaster should have no hesitation in sending his son to bed with a very sore bottom. 

“Rufus has led a charmed life so far and has been smothered to death by his nanny. But as of now, he has to enter the real world. So if my son steps out of line, you should have no hesitation in beating him. A well-beaten bottom never did a boy any harm and you have my express permission and blessing to skin my lad’s backside if needs be. Brook no nonsense from him; never give my son the benefit of the doubt as if you do you will surely come to regret it.  So, if in any doubt at all, whack his backside and make sure it hurts”

And with that chilling recommendation as to the future treatment of his only son, Mr Rothery left Rufus in the tender loving care of the Headmaster and returned to London. Rufus, who had never really cared for his rather remote father, whom he felt he barely knew, experienced a growing feeling of hatred towards him. Poor Rufus who had never had a finger laid on him in his life, had now been handed over – by his own father – to an unknown disciplinary force, against which he himself had no defence.

It is not surprising that on that first night away from home, feeling totally abandoned and more or less thrown to the wolves as he saw it, Rufus sobbed himself gently to sleep in his prep-school dormitory.  But had he been less preoccupied with his own problems, and paid attention to his dorm mates, he would have realised that he was not alone in his tears. He was simply experiencing what was par for the course in the education of upper-class, young, English boys.

Once over the initial hump of being abandoned at school, Rufus along with his co-abandonees, quickly settled down to a life which, apart from the ever present threat of getting one’s bum (that’s what all the young boys called their bottoms) swished, was not at all bad. But as Rufus found out, his first experience with the cane, never ever pleasant for any young boy, was especially so for a boy like him, on whom no hand of correction had hitherto ever been laid.

Whether Rufus was, in fact, as mischievous and rebellious as his father had told the Headmaster, he was certainly a chatterbox. And it was his incessant tendency to talk during lessons which led to his first taste of the very doubtful pleasure of the dreaded cane. That first swishing, which occurred at the end of his first week at the school, was what might be termed a double first. Not only was it Rufus’s first encounter ever with the cane, but he was also the first boy in his class to be swished.

His form-master, Mr Norman, a youngish, and at first sight pleasantly agreeable man, nevertheless ruled over his charges with a rod of iron,  or perhaps better put, with a very swishy rattan cane.  He was a strictly-no-nonsense-teacher from the word go, who like most teachers of eight-year-old, new boys, taught them a wide variety of subjects at an elementary level. As such, the boys spent most of their time under his personal tutelage and he quickly came to know all of his charges and their individual foibles quite well.

To be fair to him, he had warned Rufus numerous times about his incessant chatter in class, which he found disruptive – which it was. The final straw came on Friday morning that first week of term, when after the third warning that very morning, Rufus was again caught talking, Mr Norman told him to stay behind when the bell sounded for the lunch-break. He was soon to learn that when it came to dealing with disobedient boys, underneath that superficially affable exterior,  Mr Norman had a heart of solid stone.

Whether Rufus realised the significance of what was about about to happen to him, the rest of the class was agog with curiosity as this was the first time that one of their classmates had been singled-out to stay behind – and before lunch too. What was going to happen to him was the question on the lips of all his schoolmates’. The last lesson before lunch finally ended and the bell to signify the beginning of the lunch break rang. 

The bell rang at noon precisely, but the meal was served at twelve-thirty to give the boys a half hour break during which they could fraternise with each other before lunch. And it was in that half-hour before lunch that Rufus Rothery made the first of what, over the course of the years, would become his numerous acquaintances with the cane.

“Come with me Rufus; you and I have some urgent business to attend to before lunch today.”  Mr Norman called Rufus Rothery by his Christian name as was the custom throughout the school until the boys reached the age of eleven when the use of surnames became de rigueur, as was also the case throughout the upper school.

Mr Norman placed a hand behind Rufus’s neck and swiftly sped him to a small room down the corridor in which Rufus was now to make his first acquaintance with the cane, as indeed were also many of his classmates before the end of their first term at St. Olaf’s.  Rufus, who until they arrived at the room had still been totally unaware of the fate awaiting him, suddenly read the sign on the door: Correction Room. It then hit him like a ton of bricks: he was going to be punished; and like many boys in his situation, he found himself suddenly petrified at the thought of what was about to happen to him.  

And like many before him in a similar situation of uncertainty about was was to be be inflicted on him, he suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to take a pee. However, allowing Rufus to take a pee was definitely not on Mr Norman’s agenda at that moment as he opened the door and propelled Rufus firmly into the dreaded room.

What took place in the room became immediately clear. On one wall hung a selection of rattan canes of various calibres, beneath which stood a table on which were sitting a number of squat, square, rigid, kneeling cushions of varying thicknesses.  Against the facing wall were standing three wooden chairs with backs of different heights, each with a leather padded top rail and stiffly padded leather seats.

Although Rufus had never seen any of such implements of corporal punishment before in young life, he nevertheless saw that here was a place where boys were caned: but even more to the point, a place where HE HIMSELF was about to be caned. Viewing the range of equipment available, it was obvious that whoever had conceived the place had arranged matters with considerable foresight so the boys of all heights and ages could present their nether anatomy in the perfect position for punishment.

That awful, fatidic moment had arrived, as Mr Norman said to him: “Rufus, I don’t know how many times I have told you this week to stop talking in class and disrupting the lessons. You boy, are here to be educated; to learn something; but that is never going to happen if you continue in your present ways.  This morning I told you three times to shut up, but you chose to ignore me.”

“It is said that a cat has nine lives; well, Rufus, you have already used up your quota of the human equivalent twice over and you must now face the consequences of your continued disobedience. Rufus Rothery, kindly take of your blazer and shoes and step out of your shorts and underpants as I am now going to swish your bottom with one of those canes you see on the wall over there.  

Rufus, in spite of his his naivety, was not a complete dope and had already realised that fate – or better put, his own disobedience – had   decreed that he was destined to be swished and that one or other of the canes was shortly to mate with his bum. That was a fact that his young mind had already, more or less, accepted as inevitable.

But the fact that he had now been told by Mr Norman to take of his shorts and underpants was something he had not reckoned with. He was now faced with the blood-curdling prospect of being swished directly on his bare bottom.  To be swished at all, was an unpleasant prospect; but to be swished on the bare, as he subsequently learned was the expression to describe the barbaric act to which he was about to be subjected, did not bear thinking about.

Not surprisingly, Rufus did not react immediately to Mr Norman’s order to denude his lower body of all its clothing. “Sir, you don’t mean that you are going to swish me on my bare bum sir, do you? Please sir, at least let me keep my shorts on; please sir, not on my bare bum.  And sir, I just wanted to tell you that as I’ve never ever been swished before sir, I’m terribly frightened.”

“Rufus, when I give a boy an order, I expect it to be obeyed. You my boy, are already in enough trouble due to your constant disregard of my warnings to stop chattering in class. Now do as I say and take off both your trousers and underpants and let me see your bare bum – as you choose to call it. And yes I am going to swish you on the bare, as that is the way things are done here at St. Olaf’s.”

Mr Norman’s voice was becoming ever more stentorian as he went on: “So you had better accept that fact right now that here in this  school all swishing are given on the bare. And just let me tell you that if you do not mend your ways, you will find that your bum and my cane will be on a regular collision course with each other. Come on, boy, get your shorts and pants off and let’s get on with it before I get really cross with you.”

By now, Rufus was totally terrified  of what  was about to happen to him and fearing that things might get worse he hastily shed his lower garments and like all boys in a similar position, waiting to be told what to do next, stood there embarrassed by his semi-nakedness.  Rufus was a normal sort of size for an eight-year-old boy and having sized him up, Mr Norman pulled forward the lowest backed of the three chairs and told Rufus to kneel on its seat and bend over the padded back rail. 

Then seeing that the lad’s bottom was still rather low, he selected one of the hard cushions, made Rufus stand up, placed the cushion on the seat of the chair and then told Rufus to kneel on it again.  With the extra height provided by the cushion, Rufus’s bum was stretched across the top rail of the chair back and in the perfect position for swishing.

The perceptive reader of this story will have noticed that the word swishing is being used to describe the act of flagellation about to be inflicted on poor Rufus’s naked bum. I say poor Rufus, as one has a certain degree of sympathy with any boy, whatever his innate character, who has just been thrust into an unknown and foreign environment and is faced with his first taste of the cane.  However due to his continued disobedience Rufus is solely to blame for the predicament in which he now finds himself. 

But it is important to note that Rufus is about to be swished and not beaten, by Mr Norman, who will use only a very light cane on the eight-year-old boy in an attempt to inculcate a sense of responsibility for his own actions into the lad.  So although his punishment will sting quite a bit, it can in no way be compared with sort of beating regularly practised on older boys in English public schools at the end of the nineteenth  century, when absolutely excruciating pain was regularly delivered on the bare, with heavier calibre canes.

The six strokes of the cane which Mr Norman is about to give Rufus, will certainly bring tears to the lad’s eyes and will sting like hell for the rest of the day; but by the following morning, the lad will have be totally recovered from his ordeal.

Of course, once the boys reach the age of eleven, heavier canes are used  and punishments  become more severe as boys are gently prepared for what can but be described as the brutality of the upper school, a place where the Headmaster, the housemasters, the head-boy and the prefects all wield the cane with considerable vigour on a regular basis. And make no mistake; prefects beating one of their schoolmates on the bare – as they very often and, sad to say, willingly, do – is usually an unbelievably painful experience.

But let us come back to Rufus whose naked buns are still stretched across the chair waiting for their first ever kiss of the cane.  The fact as we now know, that he is only going to receive a light swishing, is still unknown to him. For Rufus this is easily the most horrible moment in his young life to date. And as one can see, his buns are twitching with fear as Mr Norman taps his chosen cane across the two plump mounds of naked flesh.

Rufus automatically tenses and braces himself for his ordeal; and make no mistake, for him – as for any boy for that matter – it truly is an ordeal to have his naked bum swished by a cane for the first time ever. The cane suddenly descends to mate with a sharp crack with its target and what seems to Rufus like excruciating pain flashes through his bum; and as stroke follows stroke the lad cries put with pain until suddenly the nightmare is over and he hears Mr Norman telling him to stand up and put back on his clothes and go to join his classmates for lunch.

His classmates clamour around Rufus, who is the first of their number to have been swished. In the fifteen or so minutes remaining before the boys are required to go to table, they rush Rufus to the lavatories where he is made to bare his bum yet again to allow them to inspect the damage. 

Then, as young boys inevitably do, they hoo and ah over the faint stripes left by what, in reality was just a light swishing and express their sympathy, accompanied by crocodile tears, whilst simultaneously secretly savouring the misfortune which has befallen their classmate. Oh yes, make no mistake, the concept of Schadenfreude – pleasure at the misfortunes of others – begins early in the English public school education system.

It goes without saying that Rufus’s classmates are all hoping at the same time that they will never be invited by Mr Norman to enjoy the same experience. Nevertheless, even as first formers at prep-school, the innate prurient and salacious curiosity of schoolboys of all ages and the ever hidden, but omnipresent pleasure of seeing one of their number suffer already arouses them in ways they do not yet understand.

In spite of his aching bum, a gently sniffling Rufus found that he was able to sit down to eat his lunch, which gives you an idea of the relative lightness of the punishment he had just received. 

CHAPTER 2

During his entire career at the prep-school Rufus found himself regularly in trouble of some sort or another and, accordingly his bum was subject to frequent encounters with the cane. Moving on to the end of the summer term when Rufus was thirteen years old and next term, in September, would move to the upper public school, St.Olaf’s College, he received what was jokingly referred to by the boys as an invitation from the Headmaster to attend what was universally referred to by the boys as the ETT – The End of Term Treat.

An unwelcome invitation to attend the ETT was not in anyway an invitation, but a command, which any boy who received it disregarded at his peril. The ETT, far from being a treat, was a very painful occasion that took place in the Headmaster’s study on the penultimate day of each term. To be invited to attend the ETT struck fear in the heart of every boy who was unfortunate enough to participate in the event, for the Headmaster’s performance with the cane at any ETT was legendary.

All boys who, during the term, had had their bottoms swished by a master at least three times, automatically received an invitation to the ETT. The Headmaster, in his wisdom, had decided that such young miscreants deserved what he called a top-up-swishing to send them on their way home the next day when term ended.  It was intended as a reminder to the unfortunate invitees that they needed to improve their behaviour and/or their performance radically, otherwise they would again find themselves in the same boat at the end of the coming term. 

Headmaster’s swishings were usually more painful than the regular, relatively light canings the boys received during the term and were much more severe for older boys. The ETT was a sort of sting-in-the tail – metaphorically and literally – which ensured that any lucky participant in the event enjoyed a less than comfortable journey home for the holidays.

But what was in its own way as bad – or possibly even worse than the swishing when it finally came – was the seemingly interminable wait in the corridor with the other invitees, before being called individually into the Headmaster’s study to meet one’s own fate. 

This was the one occasion in the school term at which the Headmaster required that the boys, who were to benefit from his largesse, were required to present themselves what the Headmaster termed appropriately dressed for the occasion. This was an idea that he had borrowed from the senior school, where boys were always required to change into their gym shorts and vests before presenting themselves at the Headmaster’s study for punishment.

For Rufus, this occasion was at the end of his last term at the prep-school. Given his penchant for mischief, it was not the first time that he had received an invitation to attend the ETT and in common with many boys who were swished quite frequently, Rufus had become rather blasé about the additional caning he was about to receive. After all it was just another swishing. He had suffered it all before and anyway this was his very last time; so who cared? But he reckoned without the fact that Headmaster saw matters rather differently.

So, Rufus, wearing only the required shorts and vest, found himself the eldest boy in a line of some ten lads ranging from first formers through all the age grades of the school. A smarmy, thirteen-year-old monitor, one of Rufus’s own classmates, was in charge of the line-up and told them, officiously, to arrange themselves in ascending order of age as the Headmaster dealt with the boys in order from youngest to eldest. So as the senior boy on this his final occasion to be invited to the ETT, Rufus was to be the last boy to be called in to face his Headmaster.

The Headmaster, as ever, did not rush things and so Rufus was obliged to stand there for a full half hour, which seemed more like a day, as boy after boy was called in to meet his fate. The crack of the cane mating with naked buttocks resounded through the closed door and Rufus witnessed a procession of sobbing boys leave the study vigorously massaging their stinging bottoms.

Finally Rufus was called in to face the music:  “Rothery, I seem to have seen – a euphemism for swished – you more than any other boy during the course of your time with us. And now looking through your file, I see that each year, if not the most swished boy of your form, you have always been among the top few postulants for that ignominious honour.”

“One would have hoped by now, young-man, after all the correctional care that your masters and I myself personally have lavished on your backside each year, that you would have seen the light and mended your mischievous ways. Alas that does not seem to e the case.”

“It is not, Rothery, that you are delinquent in your studies; indeed quite the contrary, for you are regularly top of your class in most subjects. But academic excellent alone is not enough.  You cannot go on making mischief and disrupting lessons the way you seem determined to do.”

“So, young-man, there comes a moment of reckoning, when – even in a prep-school – disobedience finally merits serious retribution. I am sorry to have to tell you that that unfortunate moment has now arrived for you, Rothery. Next year you will no longer be with us but will be enjoying life in the upper school. Just let me tell you, young-man, that the swishings you have received during your years with us this school, will seem like flea bites compared with the beatings which you will receive in the upper school if you do not mend your ways.”

“I would be remiss in my duties to allow you to leave this school without drawing your attention to the dangers awaiting you in the upper school if you continue on your present trajectory, which, given all the evidence before me, seems eminently probable. And for that reason, I have decided, as this is your very last visit to my study before you leave us forever, to make the occasion truly memorable for you.”

“I do this with great reluctance, but I feel that forewarned is forearmed and that you deserve to know what you might be facing next term.  And so, Rothery, it is with great regret that the traditional end-of-term the top-up swishing , which as ever you richly merit as you have already been swished no less than four times this term, will, this time, be replaced by a proper beating on the bare with a true junior cane.”

“It is my sincere hope that this quite exceptional step, which, allow me to assure you, I undertake with a very heavy heart, is purely with your own best interests in view. I sincerely hope that it will convince you to improve your behaviour. If not, then what you are now about experience will, I regret to say, become a regular feature of your life in the upper school.”

It was not until the Headmaster came to the end of his long, wordy lecture and said what he actually intended do to him as he uttered the fateful words,  a proper beating on the bare with a true junior cane, that Rufus finally grasped what was about to happen to him.  As the impact of the words resonated though his body, Rufus felt as though he had had a ton of bricks thrown at him.  His blood ran hot and cold with the thought of what he was to experience in the next few minutes.

The difference between a swishing, with which he was very familiar and which he nonchalantly shrugged off almost as a non-event, was to be replaced with a true beating. His backside was about to be moved into unknown territory and he was terrified. Certainly the boys at the prep-school knew that things were different in the upper school. But the upper school was in the future and what might happen to them there was pure conjecture.

But to be told he was to be given a sample of what might be in store for him next term seemed totally unjust. Why had the Headmaster suddenly decided to give him a foretaste of what might happen to him in the future when, if he behaved himself, it might possibly never take place?

The Headmaster did not ask Rufus to comment on anything he had said as he picked up from his desk a much heavier looking cane than Rufus had ever even seen before, let alone felt on his backside. His thoughts flashed back to that first time he had been swished, when as a new boy, aged just eight, Mr Norman had taken him to the correction room and introduced his bare bum to the doubtful delights of the cane.

He had been terrified then, but over the years he had become a regular visitor to the correction room and had become inured to what was really nothing more than a gentle, but nonetheless unpleasant, sting from the very light canes used. But now, faced with a proper bare-bottom beating with what looked to him like a vicious rattan cane, he was again just as terrified as he had been that first time. But terrified or not, that was what was now going to happen and he had no alternative but to grin and bear it.

“Rothery, if you would be so good as to take of your shorts and bend across the back of the chair over there, I think we are ready to begin.”

When Rufus did not react immediately to the order to offer up his naked bum for punishment, the Headmaster said: “Did you hear what I just told you to do Rothery. I expect my orders to be obeyed immediately; so come on boy; get a move on and let me see your bare bottom held high over the back of the chair so that we can get on with things.”

Trembling with fear of the unknown, Rufus finally did as he was told and felt the Headmaster lay the cane across the middle of his buttocks before raising it into the air for the first stroke.  Then he heard that characteristic swish as the cane descended at high speed to land in the exact middle of his two buns. The cane was sufficiently flexible to adapt itself to the contours of its target and Rufus suddenly felt a searing pain right across both buns of his naked backside.  That first stroke, with what is usually referred to as a junior cane, was far, far worse than anything he had experienced in his entire career at prep-school to date.  It moved what was commonly referred to as the act of correction into an excruciatingly painful new sphere.

Experienced as he was in the punishment of boys, the Headmaster did not in any way rush things as he applied, with suitable appreciation pauses between each stroke, no less than twelve stinging cuts to Rufus’s bottom. Rufus was in absolute agony, when after the twelfth stroke, which had been delivered low down in the crease, he was finally told to stand up and put back on his shorts.

From what he had just experienced, he saw that Headmaster had not been joking when he had said the numerous swishings he had received during his many years at the prep-school would seem like flea bites compared with the beatings which he would receive in the upper school.  From the age of about ten, Rufus had managed to stop himself crying when he was swished. But today was something totally different and by the third stroke he was already in tears and begging – in vain of course – the Headmaster to stop.

But now it was all over, and with his backside on fire, a sobbing Rufus hobbled way back to his dormitory where his friends with whom he had spent his entire school career to date were as eager as ever to view his war wounds, for that is what the lads called the stripes of any swishing.

No one, Rufus included, had known what the Headmaster had had in store for him when he had gone off to join the end of term EET contingent. Everyone assumed that it was just bad luck that Rufus had qualified for an invitation, as had many of them too in the past. But when Rufus told them what had happened and showed off his backside with its twelve livid-red welts, they all shuddered with fear at the thought that the same thing could happen to any of them when they moved to the upper school next term.

The boys were viewing for the first time, with that conflicting mixture of pleasure, awe and fear, what was vulgarly referred to by the entire school as well-beaten arse. Rufus Rothery as a boy of eight had been the first boy of his year to be swished by his form-master. And now, at the end of his prep-school days, he had been the first boy of his year to receive a proper bare-bottom beating with a serious cane.

Whether his beating could be justified or not, it had happened and it taught the young Rufus one important lesson: that the Headmaster of the school seemed to be answerable to no one when it came to beating his charges. He had exercised complete authority when he had give Rufus what was, by any standards, a very severe beating for a thirteen-year-old boy. Had Rufus wished to complain, there was no one at all to whom he could turn.  A Headmaster as he was rapidly learning was more or less the lord of all he surveyed.

CHAPTER 3

When his prep-school Headmaster had given Rufus his final ETT supplementary punishment in the form of a proper, twelve-cut beating rather than a top-up to the customary prep-school swishing, he had not been joking when he said that the swishing that Rufus had endured during his prep-school years would, in retrospect, feel like fleabites when compared with what he would receive when he moved to the upper school.

At the prep-school, swishings had been limited to either the form- master or the Headmaster and had always been given with a very light cane.  But here at St. Olaf’s College, the upper, public school, where Rufus now found himself, danger seemed to be everywhere. The Headmaster, the four housemasters, the house-captains, the prefects and the head-boy himself all wielded the cane on a regular basis.

To coin a phrase, to the boys, the unhappy recipients of their flagellative excess, they were all reminiscent of set of trigger-happy cowboys sheriffs shooting to kill.  And to a last man, they were all ready to use the cane, the inimitable crack of which as it mated with some poor lad’s naked butt, was a familiar sound throughout the upper school.

So generally accepted and practised had the use of the cane become at St. Olaf’s that some young wag had coined the name St. Hell-Holes, which in a way truly reflected the general correctional ethos which reigned in the school. No infraction, however slight, if detected by any of the numerous cane-toting set, went unpunished. So this, in a nutshell, was the correctional environment in which Rufus Rothery now found himself. 

And as if things could not have been worse, he also found that he was fagging for the then head-boy, Jeremy Sefton, a stunningly handsome young-man, just nineteen and in his final year at the school. Sefton, as Rufus was soon to find out for himself, under a superficially charming outward veneer, was a totally unpleasant type: not to mince words, Jeremy Sefton was a bully with a strong sadistic streak in his make-up. To be quite frank, the head-boy was an absolute shit when it came to dealing with his younger schoolmates, over all of whom, his fag included, he ruled like an autocrat.

Rufus’s first meeting with his head-boy fag-master was superficially all sweet light, as Jeremy Sefton handed him a detailed hand-written list of what his duties as his personal fag would be.

“So Rothery, provided that you address the tasks as laid out on that list and execute them correctly, I see no reason why you and I should not enjoy an agreeably collaborative year together.  For you, it is your first year at St. Olaf’s, whereas for me it is my final year. Anyway, for our year together, I want you to think of me as a friend whose ever-ready and experienced hand will guide you through the vicissitudes of your new life at St. Olafs.  One of my main duties, both as your fag-master and head-boy of this school, is, of course, to see that you obey the school rules generally and discharge your fagging duties satisfactorily.”

“And so I am sure you will understand and agree with me that it may well become necessary from time to time that I shall need to correct you. We all make mistakes and have to take the responsibility for them, which can often be rather disagreeable. I am sure that you will take such correction, which as you will realise I only ever undertake  for your own benefit, in good part, as any true gentleman does. It should not, in any way, alter the happy relationship between you and me, which I, for my part will endeavour to see is maintained throughout our year together.”

“Now I do not intend in any way to be unfair to you and so I think it would be useful if, when I draw your attention to any failing on your part, you yourself make a note of it in the booklet I have placed on the mantelpiece.”

The head-boy still had an open coal fireplace in his room and one of Rufus’s more onerous tasks was to fetch the coal for it, clean out the previous day’s ashes and and re-lay and re-light the fire each day, this being the only means of heating the room.”

“Then, as I wish to be scrupulously fair with you, we will meet here each Friday evening after supper when we will together review your week’s performance. On that occasion, in the light of the facts, we will jointly decide whether you need to be corrected or not.”  He left unsaid what would happen to Rufus if the answer to that question, which as Rufus had already divined, was yes.

Rufus had listened with an ever increasing degree of uneasiness to this long and ponderous speech from such a young-man.  He had no idea at all what Jeremy Sefton meant when he talked of vicissitudes. What on earth were vicissitudes and what did he mean when he said: his ever-ready and experienced hand will guide you through the vicissitudes of your new life?

But Rufus Rothery, aged only thirteen, was nobody’s fool and having listened to these the first, self-important utterings of his fag-master, and seen the hard glint in his eye, he had already realised that what you saw and heard, which was all very agreeable to both eye and ear. was, very likely, not what you got; and of course he was so very right.

It goes without saying that nothing he did for his fag-master that first week was satisfactory. And so each day, Rufus was obliged to enter in detail all his little peccadilloes in that horrible, little book on the mantelpiece. It was therefore not surprising that he presented himself to his fag-master, in a justifiably nervous state, at the fatidic hour of eight that Friday evening for the first of what was to become his regularly Friday night appraisals.

With mincing precision Jeremy Sefton picked over every detail of Rufus’ notes. As time passed it was obvious that he was becoming more and more disgruntled with his fag’s work until he finally threw down the book.

And then, without having given Rufus, who had sat there silently listening to the litany of his faults, any opportunity to defend himself, he said:  “Well Rothery, after that review, I think we both agree that your performance this first week as my fag has been less than satisfactory and calls for immediate action.  It would be a dereliction of my duty as your fag-master if I allowed things to continue as they stand.”

“You need to be taken in hand seriously before your evident innate tendency to sloppiness and inattention to your duties as my fag become a habit. And so, with your best interests at heart – that time honoured but totally insincere sentiment – I  am afraid I have no alternative but to beat you, which as I am sure you will be aware, in view of your dismal performance this past week, you truly merit.”

Rufus’s heart had fallen as he listened silently to Sefton’s diatribe as he had systematically picked holes in everything he had done that week. But when the axe finally fell and he learned that he was to be beaten at the end of this, his first week at the school, his blood ran cold in his veins. But he recognised that here again he was in a situation where his fag-master exercised absolute power over him and he could do nothing to avoid the punishment. 

Power corrupts: absolute power corrupts absolutely; and it was patently obvious that the sadistic Jeremy Sefton was enjoying exercising his undoubted power over Rufus.  Rufus already saw that he was probably in for a stormy passage in his first year as the head-boy’s fag.

“Well now that we both agree that you need to be beaten – Rufus had agreed to nothing as he had not yet said a word – perhaps you will be good enough to pass me the left- hand cane which is hanging behind the door. That’s right Rothery; that’s the one: it’s what we call a junior cane, although as you are big for your age, perhaps we might soon consider the other one: the senior cane. But as it is your first week at school, I think we will stay with the junior cane for the moment.”

The head-boy took the cane which Rufus had unhooked from the door, flexed it a few times under Rufus’s nose. Then as Rufus winced at what was to come, his fag-master swished it down through the air a few times before saying: “Yes, I think this will do very nicely for your first time Rothery.  Now, take of your coat and pull that chair over there into the centre of the room and stand behind it.”

Rufus did as he had been told and stood coatless behind the chair, waiting for what he knew would be the next, inevitable command.

“Now Rothery, drop your trousers and underpants, bend over the back of the chair, put your hands on the seat and keep perfectly still whilst I correct you.  Do not clench your buttocks or the cane will bounce and I shall have to start again. Also, keep your hands firmly on the seat of the chair until I tell you to stand up.  And, Rothery, kindly note that if you allow your hands to stray to your arse whilst I am beating you, then I shall be obliged to start again.”

“Rothery, as this is your first week your week at St. Olaf’s and the first week as my fag, in spite of your disastrously bad performance, I have, however, decided to be lenient with you. So you may count yourself lucky that I am in a generously forgiving mood this evening. I shall therefore give you only six cuts with the cane instead of the customary twelve I normally give all junior boys, whatever their offence.”

“You should take to heart the punishment you are about to receive in retribution for your dismal performance as my fag this week and let the pain that you will undoubtedly feel, inspire you to do better next week.  Let me just tell you Rothery, if you do not wish a repeat performance of what you are about to receive, I expect to see a vast improvement next week as I will not tolerate another week of your incompetence. The solution Rothery, is entirely in your own hands. Now brace yourself boy, as this experience, although very necessary for your well-being in this school, is inevitably going to be disagreeable for you.”

What Rufus Rothery thought of this longwinded preamble to what he now saw was to be a six-cut bare arse – he had noticed that Sefton had referred to his bum as his arse – beating we shall never know.  But what Rufus had already realised was that under that charmingly handsome exterior, Sefton had a heart of solid stone. Here was a young-man who took a systematic, sadistic enjoyment in using to the full the powers of office granted to him by his position as head-boy.

Jeremy Sefton clearly saw himself as God Almighty and intended to behave as such. Before the first stroke landed on his naked backside, Rufus was already shuddering inwardly, not at the thought of what was unpleasantly and painfully imminent, but what the future of fagging for Jeremy Sefton portended. He was fagging for a young- man whom he had already correctly sized up as a sadistic, petty tyrant.

Rufus close his eyes and prayed that he would be able to bear the pain which he knew from that final, end-of-term, top-up-beating at prep-school was to be a very painful experience.  He wanted desperately to be able to get up from his first beating by his fag-master without a tear in his eye; and in the event, he did just manage to do that.

The first stroke cracked down with tremendous force and landed accurately where Jeremy Sefton had first tapped his naked bum with the cane. And as stroke followed stroke, each precisely placed in strictly parallel lines from top to bottom of his arse, guided precisely by that every-ready and experienced hand of his fag-master, the pain became excruciating.

But finally the sixth stroke had been delivered and Rufus was told to stand up.  Jeremy Sefton told him to pull up his pants and trousers and to put back on his coat.  With his blistered arse on fire, but with not a tear in sight, Rufus stood in front of the young-man for whom he was already developing a feeling of hatred: a feeling which would only intensify as the year progressed.

“Well Rothery, I am sorry – he wasn’t sorry at all in fact – that our first week together had to end in such a painful experience for you. But I am sure that you will appreciate that it would have been remiss of me to have overlooked your disastrous first week as my fag and allow you to continue thinking that everything was satisfactory, when the opposite was the case.”

“So I am sure you agree with me when I say that the best thing for everyone, especially for you, is that you learn to face up to your responsibilities and accept retribution for your mistakes right away. A short, sharp shock, such as the beating I have just given you, is worth ten thousand words. It brings home to the offender in a very immediate way, what will happen if he does not change his ways and improve his behaviour. And having been corrected just once has a remarkable, curative effect on the recipient, who usually shows a very immediate improvement.”

Jeremy Sefton then turned on his dazzling smile and said: “Well Rothery, now that that unpleasantness is behind us, be a good chap and go and make us both a cup of cocoa in the boys’ kitchen. Away you go Rothery; and when you get back we can sit down together, enjoy the cocoa and discuss your duties for the coming week.”

Rufus hobbled in agony to the boys’ kitchen where three second formers were just about to leave. Seeing the parlous state Rufus was in, they insisted, as boys always do, in surveying his damaged arse, which they pronounced pretty bad. When he told them that he was the head-boy’s fag, he received the comforting news that his fag-master, Jeremy Sefton, was generally considered a killer. 

St. Olaf’s, in common with a number of public schools in the north, practised the two year prefect system.  Junior prefects were chosen in their penultimate year from the lower sixth with the right to use the junior cane on first and second year boys only. Then, in their final year they became senior prefects with full beating rights across the entire school.

Now most prefects with beating rights at English public schools tend exercise them to the limit – if not beyond. But according to the three lads in the kitchen, Jeremy Sefton, as a junior prefect, had been the worst of his year’s lot and was generally feared, especially by the younger boys, for the ferocious way in which he used the cane. So caveat puer – boy be aware: handle Jeremy Sefton very carefully indeed, preferably wearing kid gloves, as, to turn a well-known aphorism on its head, it was generally considered that his bite was much worse than his bark.

The three lads all agreed; his beatings were over the top as Rufus’s blistered arse testified to his cost. And having made these encouraging observations facts about his fag-master to Rufus, they left him attempting to make the two mugs of cocoa.  I say attempting, as many of you will know just what an awkward product cocoa powder can be to the uninitiated user, which Rufus most certainly was. 

That wretched powder simply refused all his efforts to incorporate it into the boiling water which he poured onto it. And then when he added milk, great agglomerated gobbets of the dark-brown cocoa- powder persisted on floating on the surface and successfully resisted all his efforts to get them to disappear into the liquid. The two mugs of cocoa were a sorry sight as Rufus, with justifiable trepidation, carried them back to Jeremy Sefton’s study.

Rufus knew instinctively that he was in for another round of biting criticism in presenting an unpleasant looking drink to his fag-master, whom he was already thinking of as his task-master.  He had not reckoned on the volcanically explosive reaction which he got from his fag-master when he handed him the mug of cocoa.

“What, in God’s name is this foul looking mess supposed to be?  Are you capable of doing anything properly Rothery?  I asked you to make each of us a cup of cocoa and this is the mess you produce. Well if you expect me to drink that evil-looking brew, you can think again. I see now that I was too lenient with you earlier this evening Rothery. Get your naked arse across the chair again right now boy and I will again attempt to inculcate a sense of responsibility into you.”

Rufus attempted to protest: “Oh please, Sefton, please no more this evening. My butt is just so sore already, so please no more. I don’t think I can take any more; so please Sefton, please no more.”

Needless to say, Rufus’s pleas were like water off a duck’s back when it came to shifting Sefton from his stated objective. He reached up to the canes hanging behind door, but this time selected the heavier of the two.

Then turning to his terrified fag he said: “Rothery, correct me if I am wrong, but I thought a moment ago I told you to get your naked arse across the chair again. So perhaps you would be kind enough to favour me with an explanation as to why you are still standing there fully clothed.  You Rothery, are trying my patience beyond the limit that any man should be forced to endure. Now boy, get your coat off; drop your pants and underwear and let me see your bare arse again across that chair there in double quick time. Come on boy: jump to it or it will be the worse for you.”

Poor Rufus did as he had been told. Jeremy Sefton gazed, a look of self-satisfaction across his face, at the six, deep, parallel welts adorning his fag’s backside, which were now turning from their original livid red colour to the rich purple hue as they matured.  Rufus trembled with fear as he waited for the second onslaught on his arse within half an hour, praying fervently to a God, in whom he had little faith, that he would not break down into tears.

Sefton after surveying his earlier handiwork, finally decided to embellish what he himself now thought of as an unfinished masterpiece of the art of flagellation, by placing three, stinging strokes with the senior cane he held in his hand,  diagonally across the existing welts, thereby completing what to his eye was a harmonious whole.

As the cane descended three times more across Rufus’s blisteringly painful arse, he could no longer hold back his tears, nor could he manage to remain silent. And so as each stroke landed, it elicited an uncontrolled cry of pain and reduced the lad to a flood of tears. As Jeremy Sefton surveyed his finished masterpiece of flagellation art with a certain degree of satisfaction, Rufus Rothery, still bent over the back of the chair, was in absolute agony.

If ever a boy had had an introduction to the severity of life at a typical English public school it was Rufus Rothery at that first Friday evening at St. Olaf’s. His experiences at prep-school had not been altogether without pain; but if Jeremy Sefton’s performance with the cane reflected the ethos of St. Olaf’s, then he knew he had taken that metaphorical jump out of the frying pan into the fire; or better put, as he had had no choice in the matter of the move to the upper school, he had been tipped from the frying pan into the fire.

But whether jumped or tipped it made no difference at all. As he limped back to his dormitory, he knew that his backside was on fire: it was hurting like hell. He had learned with a vengeance the difference between a swishing and a beating, which he did not like one little bit.

CHAPTER 4

Having experienced what can but be described as a baptism of fire at the hands of the then head-boy, Jeremy Sefton, Rufus’s first few years at St. Olaf’s were punctuated at regular intervals by altercations with the cane wielded – in his first year – by the said Jeremy Sefton, but also as time progressed, by subsequent head-boys and prefects, his housemaster and on one horribly painful occasion, when he was just fifteen, by Mr. Hamilton, the Headmaster, himself.

It was subsequent to that, his first and only beating by the Headmaster, that it suddenly dawned upon Rufus that his backside always came off the loser, whenever, as he frequently was, invited by one or other of the many cane wielders, to present his naked buns to them for correction.

But that awful evening – and it truly was the most excruciatingly painful of any beating he had received  – when he had been invited, along with his two other partners in crime, to present himself wearing just his gym shorts and vest at the Headmaster’s study, was the deciding factor in Rufus’s reformation.  Rufus together with two of his dorm-mates had been caught by one of the junior prefects, drinking beer and smoking and reported to the Headmaster.

Now breaking of any rule at St. Olaf’s led – if caught in the act – to an automatic beating for the offender.  But there were rules and rules and the two concerning the prohibition of smoking and drinking were writ large. They and were what might be called RULES, any infraction of which led automatically to a mandatory visit to the Headmaster with all that that implied.  And so it was not without a severe feeling of trepidation that the three trembling miscreants lined up in the corridor outside the Headmaster’s study that evening awaiting their fate.

All of them knew that they deserved the punishment they were about to receive. That their arses were forfeit was for sure; but none of them quite appreciated the gravity with which the Headmaster viewed their delinquency. However, to their infinite regret they were soon to find out with a vengeance the seriousness of their situation. The Headmaster allowed them stand around, stewing in their own juice in the corridor for nearly fifteen minutes where their nervousness mounted with each passing minute  after some fifteen minutes, he finally  called all three of them together into that holy of holy’s, his study, to meet their private Waterloo. 

I was the first time any of the three lads had actually been inside the Headmaster’s study. The great man himself, looking as grim as death, sat behind his desk in front of which the three condemned lads were told to stand to attention. First, came the usual review of their recent sins, which, as the Headmaster droned on, seemed to go on forever, at the conclusion of which the three lads felt they had committed a crime whose seriousness verged on murder. Then the axe finally fell and their fate became known.

“In view of the extremely serious nature of your joint delinquency in flouting two of the most important and inviolable rules of this school you will all be punished very severely. In fact I intend to make an example of all three of you as a warning to the whole school of the wages of sin. Broscombe and Winters, (the names of Rufus’s co-sinners) you will each receive a twelve-stroke beating with a senior cane across you bare buttocks.”

“But as for you Rothery, in view of your hitherto continuous history of mischievousness and flouting any rule which you have hitherto felt you could get away with, you young-man will receive a truly exemplary punishment in the form of an eighteen stroke beating, also on the bare. And just before you even think of complaining about the injustice of the system, I think you need to thank your lucky stars that I am not giving the full twenty-four cuts, which, allow me to assure you, are permissible under the school regulations.”

In fact, in spite of the severity of the sentences, which could have been much worse – they could have been expelled – the three lads were sort of relieved that they were each to escape with just another blistered arse.

However, the sting of the Headmaster’s words was in the tail as he added:  “I intend to make this an occasion which none of you will ever forget, and therefore I intend to beat each of you twice.  So you, Broscombe and Winter will each receive a first round of six cuts each, whilst you, Rothery, will have the dubious privilege of taking nine initial strokes.”

“Then each of you will, in turn, offer up your bare backsides again to me for my most earnest attention, when I shall be delighted to exercise what I understand is referred to among the boys on the grapevine as my legendary skill. I shall give each of you your complement of strokes, each of which I will double the initial cuts you will already be wearing.”

Once the horrible significance of what the Headmaster had just said sank in, all three boys paled visibly; it was his declared intention to place each of the second-round of strokes directly on the first series of welts he had raised with the cane. So to the examining post beating eye, of which there would be many, at first sight a twelve stroke beating would look superficially as if only six cuts had been given. But closer examination would show from the depth of the welts that each had been the object of two successive strokes of the cane.  Can you imagine much pain the unfortunate recipients of such a beating would be in or the inhibiting affect it would have on the observers?

It was bad enough to contemplate this happening just once; but six – or  for Rufus, nine times – was beyond belief. As the implication of what the Headmaster had just said to them sank in, the prospect of what was about to happen to them moved from bad to terrifying. The degree of pain they were about to experience for their misdemeanour had just ratcheted up from 5 to 9.5 on the 1 to 10 scale of an imaginary Pain Delivery Index, therebye moving it up from bad to well nigh unbearable. But unbearable or not, they would have to bear it!

“It is not my custom to beat boys together and to allow them to observe their classmates’ being punished. However in this case as the three of you have, together as a group, broken two of the most sacred rules of this school, I propose to allow the three of you to be present throughout this sad and I suspect, unforgettably painful  moment, in your school careers.”

“You will thus be able to transmit in the post-operative viewing by your classmates of what I understand are usually called your war wounds, the agonisingly painful retribution which you have harvested for your sins and thereby, hopefully, warn off other potential offenders with the fear, that if caught, they will receive the same. I always think that viewing of a boy’s well-beaten, naked backside by his classmates is a powerful deterrent.”

Standing up from behind his desk, he went across to a cupboard, opened it, rummage around in it for a few moments before turning around to the three lads holding a formidable looking rattan cane in his right hand. “Well young sirs, shall we put my theory to the test? Stand in a line against the wall and take off your shorts and then place your hands your heads.”

The three lads looked at each other aghast at what they had just been told to do. To stand there with their genitalia totally exposed to the Headmaster whilst he thrashed them was something none of them had bargained for. Like most lads of fifteen, they were well into puberty and all three of them were well equipped with those fundamental elements of masculinity, which in the future, if they did not already do so, they would treasure as their most precious possessions.

To see one another naked in the showers each day, as they did, was one thing; but to stand there naked, hands on their  head with their sex organs exposed under the grim, penetrating gaze of the Headmaster was quite another.  And, of course, to make matters worse, those totally incontrollable appendages, their cocks, had decided to do their worst and had stiffened to attention. Not surprisingly, the three of them were already dying their first death of the evening brought on by their total embarrassment, before the first kiss of the cane delivered its painful message to their naked arses.

The Headmaster pulled a chair into the middle of the room, pointed to Broscombe with the cane and said: “You first, boy; over the the back of the chair, put your hands on the seat and keep them there until I tell you to stand up. Come on, boy, jump to it and get your backside well up so that I can see what I am doing.” 

Broscombe did unwillingly what he had been told to do and the Headmaster started on the first leg of his six round marathon of flagellation.  Rufus, who was what one might call a connoisseur when it came to being caned, had never, in fact, actually seen a boy being beaten as was now the case. He was fascinated by the systematic way in which the Headmaster applied those first six strokes to Broscombe’s arse. The beating was performed systematically, with no undue haste and with a ten second appreciation pause left between each stroke. 

Prior to each stroke, the Headmaster laid the cane in the exact place where he intended it to mate with Broscombe’s naked backside, before raising it into the air and bringing it down to land with that inimitable crack of well-seasoned rattan mating with naked flesh, exactly on its intended target. When he had finished his first round of embellishing Broscombe’s buns, the lad was told to stand up, place his hands again on his head and stand in line again to wait for the second round of his beating.

Rufus observed that his friend had now a text-book beaten arse, with his six, evenly-spaced and strictly-parallel cuts reaching from top to bottom of his posterior. The Headmaster really did know what he was doing. Rufus realised that he had witnessed a true expert at work, and although he knew he was shortly about to suffer the same fate – or actually even worse – the Headmaster did have his grudging admiration.

Next Winters and then, finally,  Rufus himself underwent the same painful procedure, before after a five minute pause, which seemed to the boys more like an hour, during which they were made to stand there, hands on their heads and forbidden to touch their blistered backsides, the second awful round of their punishment began.

It was Broscombe who was again the first of the triumvirate to have his arse re-addressed by the cane. And now, as Rufus watched his friend receive a further six agonising cuts, each overlaid with exact precision on the first six, in spite of the fact he knew he himself was to suffer an even worse fate a few minutes later, what had initially been fascination at the Headmaster’s precise delivery, now turned into sheer admiration as he watched the expertise with which the Headmaster wield the cane. 

The legendary skill of which the Headmaster had spoken, which the word legendary implies a certain unauthenticated assertion, turned out, in the event, to be very real. The old boy really was a crack with the cane and justified his reputation. As the three boys, all in tears, hobbled back to their dormitory to be greeted by their dorm-mates for the post-execution viewing, Rufus swore to himself that never ever again would he allow anyone else to address his arse with the cane.  Bearing, as he was, nine livid, excruciatingly painful, double cuts, he did not know how to ease the pain, which he knew would be with him for several days. If anyone had learned his lesson that day, it was Rufus Rothery.

But I spite of the extreme pain in which he found himself, Rufus found he still admired the Headmaster for his technique. He admitted to himself that he had actually enjoyed watching the Headmaster exercise the tools of his trade with such consummate expertise on the backsides of his two friends even though he himself had then suffered the same fate.

He knew that deep down inside of himself, he wanted to be able to inflict pain on a schoolboy in the way he had just seen the Headmaster do.  This was the first conscious awakening and acceptance, aged just sixteen, as he now was, of the innate sadistic streak with which he had been endowed at birth; a streak of sadism which was to condition his future career.

CHAPTER 5

It may surprise readers to know that in spite of the long history, first at prep-school and latterly at St. Olaf’s, of the magnetic attraction which his backside seemed to have for the cane,  after that monumental, eighteen stroke beating by the Headmaster, Rufus did manage to keep out of trouble and keep his vow to himself. By some miracle he avoided ever being caned again during his senior years at St. Olaf’s.

Rufus had always been one of the brightest, if not the brightest boy in his class and was first or second in most subjects. And in his favourite subjects, Latin and Greek, he was head and shoulders better than the next best boy. To the sheer amazement of his teachers, by the time he was sixteen he could more or less translate at sight, any classical Latin or Greek text. His mastery of both the grammar and the vocabularies of both of these ancient languages was phenomenal. He was the only boy in the school who could speak coherent, grammatically correct  sentences in Latin.

In spite of his rather stormy history until that fatal day when he had decided to reform himself, he was made a junior prefect when he was in the lower sixth form and then just eighteen years old. And that was the beginning of his active love affair with the cane; but this time, as a wielder and not a receiver. 

St. Olaf’s, as has been said, operated a two tier prefect system. Junior prefects, to which rank Rufus now belonged, were chosen from boys in their penultimate year in the lower sixth and then, provided that they did not blot their copy book in that position, they went on to become senior prefects in their final year in the upper-sixth form.

As a newly appointed junior prefect, along with his co-prefects, Rufus was issued with a junior rattan cane by the Headmaster. The Headmaster himself, as a previous regular receiver of the cane in his own school career, was a great believer of the benefits of corporal punishment and in an introductory address to the new prefects had encouraged them to use their newly acquired powers to keep their schoolmates in order.

“You must all be aware, as you have all been through the same mill yourselves, that given half a chance your younger schoolmates, especially those newly arrived in the first form, will test anyone in authority – masters and prefects alike – to the limit, to see just how far they can go: to see, in fact, what they can get away with. Well it is your duty as junior prefects to see that these younger boys learn to toe the line and are allowed to get away with nothing whatsoever.”

“This school believes in the strict enforcement of the rules as many of you in the past, to your painful cost, personally know (Did Rufus detect a smile in his direction?) and the mandate to use the cane given to both junior and senior prefects is the key to enable you to enforce the rules.”

“This having been said, I must remind you that as junior prefects you are limited to a maximum of six strokes of the junior cane for any one offence.  However, your mandate does extend to correcting boys of all ages, but only with the junior cane.  Let me also remind you that if you have occasion to beat a boy for any reason whatsoever, the tradition here at St. Olaf’s, along with most other public schools in the north, is that the offender is caned on his bare buttocks and never ever on the hand, as is the case in most state schools.” 

“Now some new boys may initially resist this practice, but you must, nevertheless, insist on it: boys being beaten must be beaten on the bare. If any boy refuses to bare his buttocks for punishment then you must automatically refer him to me.  I think that you will find that the threat of a visit to his Headmaster will suddenly make him see sense.”

“I am sure that I need not remind any of you of a fact which most of you probably already know from firsthand experience: a boy’s lower rear anatomy, which I understand you boys vulgarly refer to as his arse, is capable of receiving a very thorough and painful beating with no long term damaged done.  Gentlemen, the purpose of beating a boy is to teach him that he is responsible for his actions; there is therefore no point in beating him unless it hurts.”

“In a word, when it comes to punishing a boy, pain is the name of the game. So I can but remind you of the old aphorism: spare the rod and spoil the boy. So I will conclude my remarks by saying I do not wish to see any spoiled boys here at St. Olaf’s. I hope I have made myself clear”

So there it was in a nutshell; they had each been given a cane and within the limits set by the Headmaster, had carte blanche to use it. He had said: “pain is the name of the game.”  And there was little doubt at all, that the new junior prefects, in the very best of the gentlemanly traditions practised in English public schools, were all more than ready to play the game; and  moreover, to play it wholeheartedly.

The role of the prefects at St. Olaf’s was twofold. During the school day, when boys were being taught, it was their job to see that the boys behaved properly when they were outside of the classrooms. The same was true on Saturday’s and Sundays, when there were no formal classes. The prefects, both junior and senior, acted as the school’s police force, maintaining law and order.  In fact, their power was more or less absolute, as they acted as judge, jury and executioner of any boy whom they caught in flagrante.  

In addition to their duties during the day, the prefects were also in charge of discipline in their individual houses, in the evening and at night, after lights out, in the dormitories. Each house, of which there were four, had two junior and two senior prefects, plus a Housemaster, who to a great extent, depended upon his four prefects, one of whom he nominated house-captain, too keep order in his house. So by day and night, the pupils at St. Olaf’s were under the watchful eyes of a total of sixteen prefects.

If a boy was caught by a prefect and sentenced to a beating, then that was that; there was no appeal as the prefects’ power was more or less absolute. As has already been observed earlier, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely; so many boys, who had committed a very minor peccadillo, went to bed nursing an unwarrantedly sore arse, thanks to the excessive zeal of a prefect.  On many occasions their punishments were excessive and they could probably have complained. But no one ever did; they just took beatings as part and parcel of daily life at the school.

It was into this environment and general climate of abuse by the prefects, that Rufus Rothery, possessing what he himself already knew to be a hidden and as yet undeveloped, sadistic streak and a desire to beat other boys’ arses, was let loose.  But with a junior cane now in his hand, this was the start of the road which would eventually lead to Rufus Rothery’s transformation into a tyrant.

All sixth formers at St. Olaf’s had their own individual study- bedroom. Only the head-boy himself had a study separate from his bedroom, with a wash room in a short passage joining the two. And so, as was frequently the case, for the cane at St. Olaf’s never rested for long, boys were beaten either in the library, by the prefects, or in his private study by the head-boy. 

And in the houses, beatings were given in the house common-room or, as was very frequently the case with younger boys, in their dormitories. And so an appropriate selection of rattan canes was available in the school library and in the common-room of each house.

Given his own personal motivation and his innate desire to inflict pain, a fact he would never openly acknowledge throughout his entire career, Rufus Rothery was eager to find his first – let us call him – client, on whose arse he could lavish what he, with tongue in cheek, referred to as his tender loving care with the cane.  But chance – good good fortune for him, but misfortune, alas, for them – provided Rufus with not one, but two, reluctant candidates to what was to be his inaugural performance with the cane.

It was the Friday of his first week as a prefect and quite by chance, passing within sight of the main gate of the school, he saw two boys, neither of whom was wearing his mandatory, school cap, sneaking unobserved – or so they thought – back onto the school premises from what had clearly been an illicit excursion into the town centre.

That the two boys, who were obviously first formers, knew that they were breaking a cardinal rule of the school (first formers were not allowed to leave the school premises without a signed exeat from a master) was obvious from the rather circumspective way in which they re-entered the school grounds. 

It does appear to be a fact that boys of all ages, when they know they are in the wrong, somehow universally exude a halo of guilt by the furtive air and movements they unconsciously seem to adopt, even when they are not being observed.

Add to this major misdemeanour, the fact that neither lad was wearing his school cap, Rufus was beside himself with what was clearly a bumper catch. Not one, but two, backsides would provide a splendid baptism of fire for what would be his maiden over with the cane. And so, already metaphorically salivating at the thought of the little drama that would be enacted in the library that evening, Rufus had every intention of leaving his mark – literally – on the backsides of each lad before he had even confronted them.

The two boys were suddenly jolted out of their complacency when Rufus called to them as they re-entered the school grounds.  They seemed surprised that they had been caught, as until Rufus spoke, they had been totally unaware that they had been seen by a prefect.

“Where, if I might be permitted to ask, have you two young miscreants been? Why do I find you creeping guiltily into the school grounds and with neither of you wearing your school cap to boot?  Are you not aware that first formers are not allowed to leave the school premises without the express permission of a master in the form of a signed exeat? Perhaps the pair of you would be good enough to justify your excursion into town by producing your exeats for my inspection.”

The two lads, of course, had no exeats; they had simply decided to take a walk into the town centre.  By now totally flustered and totally tongue-tied at having been caught at the end of their illicit adventure, they found it difficult to justify their actions. Nor could they explain the reason why they had neglected to wear their caps: a mandatory requirement for all boys when off the school premises. In fact, the only intelligible information to come out of this confrontation was that the boys managed to give Rufus their names: they were called Barker and Havers and were members of form 1A.

“Well, Barker and Havers, I will see the pair of you this evening eight in the library, immediately after supper, when we will put this matter to rest.”

The two boys looked glum at this. Havers, feeling that one of them had to say something, asked pitifully: “Why do we need to come to the library sir?”

“First of all Havers, you do not address me as sir, but by my surname, which is Rothery. Only the masters are addressed as sir. You address all your schoolmates, including the prefects and the head-boy himself, by their surnames only. However to answer your question, you will have to wait and see what your visit to the library this evening holds in store for you; let us just say for the moment, that it is to be a surprise.”

“But just let me tell you that activities other than reading and studying also take place in the library, especially in the evenings: activities which frankly are much less pleasant; but activities in which your recent offences make you both eminently qualified to participate. So boys; do not be late; eight on the dot in the library; is that understood?”

Late that afternoon, Rufus went along to the library himself. He felt he already knew the place intimately as over his earlier years at the school, he had been regularly invited there by different prefects to sample the doubtful pleasures of experiencing the bite of the cane across his naked arse. So he knew that there was the full complement of accoutrements of punishment there for dealing with miscreant boys: a number of chairs with backs of different heights to accommodate boys of different ages and, of course, that sine qua non of such occasions: a good selection of rattan canes.

But this time it would be different; this time, he would be the beater rather than the beaten.  And even though he desperately wanted to apply the cane to a naked arse, now, with the boot on the other foot and the goal in sight, he suddenly felt very unsure of himself. It was one thing being the passive player in the drama of a bare-arse beating, a role which he himself had played many, many times; but when it came to actually performing the act himself, of delivering unspeakable pain to a totally unprotected pair of bare buttocks, he suddenly wondered if, when push came to shove, whether he had the guts to wield the cane himself.  And what would he do if he made a hash of his first beating: of his first two beatings, to be accurate?

He was looking over the various canes which were all bristling there in one of those large and hideous oriental pots beloved by the previous generation as umbrella stands.  Rufus had selected a cane at random and was swishing it through the air, thinking that he was alone in the place, when a voice said: “It look as though some lucky lad is going to have his arse warmed before he goes to bed this evening.”

And then emerged from one of the reading bays where he had been hidden from view, the newly appointed head-boy of the year, Nigel Kingston.  As Kingston was in his final and Rufus in his penultimate year at the school, they had known each other throughout Rufus’s entire time at the school. Rufus also knew that the previous year, as a junior prefect, Kingston had quickly established a reputation for himself among the first and second formers as being one of the hardest caners in the whole school; to such an extent that he had acquired the nickname of the Killer.

“Ah it’s you, Rothery, I see, brandishing the rod of justice.”  He smiled as he reached over to the pot and extracted a long, slender, straight-handled rattan cane, which he handed to Rufus. “Speaking as someone with a certain modicum of experience in the gentle art of beating arse in this very place, if I were you, old boy, I’d use this cane rather than the one you have in your hand.”

“Last year, as a junior prefect myself, I found that when correctly applied to the bare bums of our misguided and oft offensive younger schoolmates, it certainly gave them what, from their vociferous, let us call it, appreciation, of my efforts on their arses, what I took to be expressions of the greatest pleasure.”

As he said this, he laughed at his own sarcasm before continuing: “Anyway, Rothery, congratulations on your elevation to the privileged ranks of those of us who are authorised to correct their errant, junior schoolmates by addressing their naked arses with the cane. If you take my advice you will use your first year as a junior prefect as what you should consider as a pay-back year for all the whackings you yourself had on the way up. I take it that like me, you were regularly whacked on your way through the mill of this establishment in the name of what passes for a superior education and you know, therefore, what a well beaten arse feels like.”

“That’s what I myself did. If I caught them at it, as I often did, I didn’t allow any of the young blighters to get away with anything.  I whacked their plump, little arses well and truly hard. And I frankly admit, I enjoyed every moment of it.  I think you will find that once you get into the swing of things, literally and metaphorically when it comes to wielding the cane, hearing it crack down on a well-deserving, bare backside, is a great pleasure; that is; at least how it has been for me.”

Rufus listened in silence to this frank revelation of the satisfaction which the head-boy had clearly had from using the cane on his schoolmates. But he did find himself shuddering inwardly as he wondered what the obviously cane-happy Kingston had on his percussive agenda now that he was head-boy.

He finally said:  “Frankly, Kingston, I can tell you that I feel a bit nervous about tonight.  It will be the first time I will be beating a boy;  to be strictly accurate, two boys: two first formers, in fact, whom I caught sneaking back into school after an unauthorised visit down town and with neither of them wearing their caps to boot. So I felt they needed to be corrected and so I have told them to see me here after supper at eight this evening. But now that I have actually got to perform the act myself, I feel very nervous about the whole thing.”

“Look here, Rothery, there’s nothing at all to be nervous about. You are just doing your duty as a prefect. I can tell you, if I had caught the two of them, they would be getting twelve each on the bare: six for going down town without an exeat and another six for not wearing their caps. But as a junior prefect, you will have to make do with just six; ah well, more’s the pity”

“Look, here’s my advice; don’t rush things; take your time; get each of them with his naked arse in the right position before you begin. Then lay the cane – the one I have just given you, as it’s a real cracker – on the exact spot where you want it to land, before raising it above your head to deliver the stroke.  And one tip: make sure you lay-on several strokes low down on the lads’ arses – on the so-called sit-spot – to  make it uncomfortable for the little blighters to sit down for a few days.”

“But listen, Rothery. How’s this for an idea?  Come around to my study at six-thirty straight after prep but before supper. I’m going to beat my fag this evening. He doesn’t know it yet, but his backside deserves a little treat; so I’ll be delighted to demonstrate to you first-hand, how to go about it.”

Rufus had mixed feelings about this offer. It brought back instantly to him the memory of his own first week at the school when he himself had been the head-boy’s fag and had had his arse roasted in retribution for his poor fagging performance in the selfsame study into which he was now being invited to be given a demonstration of how to use the cane.  And what made it even more unnerving, was the fact that this demonstration in the gentle art of flagellation was to be given on the backside of the present head-boy’s fag.

It seemed horribly like history repeating itself. However, like most boys, Rufus had that that prurient, inbuilt characteristic which leads most schoolboys to take a certain pleasure in the misfortunes of others. This, he knew, would dictate his acceptance of the offer.  It would only be the second time that he was actually to witness a boy being beaten.

His mind flashed back to that other fateful occasion when he, and his friends, Broscombe and Winters had each received a truly monumental beating from the Headmaster for drinking and smoking. That had been the last time he himself had been beaten. But that day, he had witnessed the cane being applied to the naked arses of both of his companions in crime.

On that occasion, to his secret shame, he found that he had truly enjoyed watching his two partners receiving their punishment. He had really taken in the finer points of the act of flagellation as practised by the Headmaster. And in spite of his own ragingly painful arse with whihc he himself later left the Headmaster’s study, he found that he was grudgingly admitting to himself, that he admired the Headmaster for his consummate skill with the cane.

He tried to convince himself that in accepting Kingston’s invitation to watch him beat his fag, he was motivated purely by the need of familiarising himself with the art of handling the cane. Of course he new that that was only partly true, as he knew full well that he would enjoy watching the poor fag getting his arse striped. Oh yes, Schadenfreude – pleasure in the misery of others – was alive and well in Rufus Rothery’s makeup.

So six-thirty that evening found him sitting with Kingston in the head-boy’s study waiting for the arrival of the victim.  Cedric Munford, for that was the fag’s name, arrived ten minutes late for the appointment with his fag-master. If the poor unfortunate fag had not known the reason for the meeting until now, the cane lying on Kingston’s desk spoke volumes. And his tardy arrival should have already made him extra-nervous.

Kingston began sarcastically: “Ah, Munford; nice of you to join us; and only ten minutes late for your appointment. There is a saying, better late than never, to which aphorism, I have to tell you, I do not personally subscribe. Allow me to tell you Munford, that when I say to my fag, six-thirty, I mean six-thirty and not six-forty.”

A, by now, very frightened-looking Munford ventured to reply:  “I’m sorry Kingston, but I simply forgot that you wanted to see me.  I really am very, very sorry; it won’t happen again; I promise you.”

“Munford, forgetfulness seems to be your forte! Has it crossed your tiny mind, that this week you have systematically forgotten numerous tasks which are part of your duties as my fag?  Twice you forgot to clean my shoes.  Twice you forgot to clean out the ashes from the fireplace and relay the fire. For all you care, I could have frozen to death. I have a strong feeling that forgetfulness seems to be an inbuilt part of your nature, Munford.”

On and on went Kingston, cataloguing the errors and omissions committed by his fag during the past week. He laid it on in spades. Nothing the lad had done was apparently right. By the time he had finished upbraiding his fag, he had reduced the lad to a trembling wreck. After he had finished listening to this over-the-top, verbal assessment of his performance, the poor lad must have thought that he had committed a capital offence.

When the verdict and sentence were eventually pronounced, Munford blanched visibly at the thought of what he was about to suffer. Rufus remembered how he had undergone the same sort of overegged, verbal battering all those years previously, when he too had been beaten by the then head-boy for whom he was fagging. Then came those traditional untruths, as Kingston set about justifying what he was about to visit on Munford’s arse.

“Munford, I am sure you will agree with me – a very doubtful premise – that  I would not be doing my duty if I were to allow you to continue in your present ways without correcting you. And so I regret to say Munford, that it is with a heavy heart and great reluctance that I have come to the conclusion that I have no alternative but to beat you, which as I am sure you will appreciate,  I am only doing for your own good. In resorting to the cane, believe me when I say that I have only your own best interests at heart.” Nigel Kingston, like many prefects before him, trotted out all these platitudinous, bare-faced insincerities with a completely straight face.

“Take of your blazer, Munford, and go and stand behind that chair over there. Then drop your trousers and underpants to the floor and bend over the back of the chair. Put your hands on the seat of the chair and keep them there until I tell you to get up. And see that you hold your bottom well into the air as part of your anatomy, along with the cane, it is the key player in our little drama. As this is your first whacking by me as your fag-master, I shall be lenient with you and give you only six.”

“But be warned Munford; you have to improve your performance otherwise in the future you will again find yourself in the same unfortunate position over that same chair waiting for twelve. And Munford, in case I forgot to mention it, keep your hands of your arse until I tell you that you may massage yourself.”

Rufus admitted to himself that the felt rather sorry for young Munford, but he supposed the lad did need correcting as he had made a lot of mistakes. However, there is correction and correction and when in the hands of that arch-flagellator, which Killer Kingston turned out to be, CORRECTION is writ large. 

Kingston went across to the door where he unhooked the junior of the two canes hanging there, went across to Munford and laid the cane across the crown of the lad’s arse. He then looked and Rufus, smiled and said very quietly: “Now, Rothery, it’s quite simple; just observe how it’s done.”

Rufus was then treated to a text-book demonstration of how to treat a boy’s arse to a session of not-so-tender-loving-care from the cane. Having determined where the first cut was to land, he raised the cane and brought it smartly down. It landed, with a resounding crack, on the exact same spot it had just left from Munford’s naked bum. Munford let out a howl of pain as the therapeutic effect of the blow worked its magic on him.  Kingston then paused for a full ten seconds before continuing.  He then placed at ten second intervals the next two cuts upwards towards Munford’s lower back, before landing the final three strokes down towards the crease of the lad’s legs.

Rufus realised immediately that in Kingston he was observing a master at work. He proceeded slowly and methodically, placing each cut of the cane exactly where he intended it, leaving a good appreciation pause between each stroke. By the time he had finished, Munford was in tears and his arse was neatly embellished with six deep parallel stripes which were already a deep crimson red.

Turning to Rufus, Kingston said: “Well Rothery, there you are; as you can see, giving a boy a proper beating is really quite a straight forward. The key points are not to rush, to place each stroke exactly where you intend it to be and to leave at least ten seconds between each cut to allow the lucky recipient, in the present case our friend Munford here, to appreciate the care and attention which are being lavished on his arse.”

“And of course, make sure that you use a really good cane: one that is rigid enough for accurate placement but flexible enough to bend itself across both of a boy’s buttocks when it mates with them. Finally, don’t stint on the force when you bring the cane down; it’s got to hurt; so make sure it truly does. A boy’s arse has got to be well striped when he gets up from a beating.”

These remarks were made with the unfortunate Munford still bent across the chair. “Right Munford, you may get up now and put back on your clothes and give your arse a good massage as I can see you are waiting to do; then off you go Munford. You can be proud of the stripes I have given you when you show them to your dorm mates in the showers this evening.”

CHAPTER 6

As Rufus left the head-boy’s study, he saw the back end of what was obviously a new boy, disappearing at speed down the corridor. Now Rufus, having himself been caught and thrashed several times in his earlier years for running in the corridors, an act which was strictly –and I do mean strictly – forbidden, suddenly realised what a mine of opportunity the corridor was, for collecting what might be described as cannon-fodder for his cane.

In fact, although running anywhere inside the school buildings  carried a mandatory punishment of six strokes of the cane, boys still broke the rules regularly, were frequently caught in the act – usually by a prefect – and found themselves going to bed nursing very sore bottoms.

On the principle of strike whilst the iron is hot, Rufus called to the boy to stop and come back to face him.  He did not know the delinquent first former, who revealed himself to be David Osborne, Osborne minor, brother of Roger Osborne: Osborne major, a contemporary, but not a close friend, of Rufus’s. Osborne minor stopped dead in his tracks, turned around, walked back and stood facing Rufus with that guilty look on his face which testified to the fact that he knew full well why he had been stopped.

When Rufus started to tear a strip off him, he nevertheless protested his innocence. “Osborne, where was it that you were going in such haste? As you know running is strictly forbidden in the corridor or anywhere else inside any of the school buildings for that matter; so I think you need to explain why you found it so important to break one of the cardinal rules of the school.”

Osborne, of course, knew full well that he had been caught in flagrante, breaking one of the school’s fundamental, and justifiably most strict, rules . Nevertheless,  he tried to talk himself out of what he knew to be a sticky situation: “Well Rothery, I wasn’t really running; you see I just wanted to see someone in the junior common-room before supper and as time was short I was just, sort of, hurrying – sort of walking quickly: speed walking – if you see what I mean.  But if you think I was going too quickly, then I don’t mind at all slowing down Rothery; really I don’t.”

“Anyway, I’m sorry if you think I was going too quickly and I promise you, now that you have drawn my attention to it, I won’t do it again; really I won’t. So please may I now go, more slowly this time, to find my pals in the common-room?”

“Osborne minor, you have an amazing ability to confuse walking quickly and running. When one walks – even quickly – the soles of one’s shoes move more or less parallel to the floor. You young-man, were not indulging in an exercise of what you fancily choose to call speed-walking, but were galloping down the corridor like a race horse. If ever a boy was running in the corridor it was you just now.”

“So now that we have established that you were, in fact, running and not walking at any speed, yes Osborne, you may run along – I speak figuratively you understand – however, not to the common-room, your original destination, but to the library a few doors down the corridor, where I shall give myself the pleasure of acquainting you with the realities of life at St. Olaf’s. Breaking one of the strictest rules of the school has painful consequences, as you are now about to find out.”

Osborne looked very nervous at what he had just heard, which certainly boded ill for him; “Rothery, do you mean I can’t go to the common-room as I wanted to, but have to go to the library instead?”

“Precisely so, my dear Osborne; your pressing visit to the common-room will have to wait until after your visit to the library. After you and and I have finished our business there, then, if time permits before supper, you may go and see your friends in the common-room; otherwise you will just have to delay seeing them until you join them at table.”

Osborne still trying to prevent what he must, by now, have known was the inevitable, grasped onto the last straw, making a feeble, last-ditch attempt to save himself:  “But Rothery, I really did want to see my friends before supper in the common-room; they are all expecting me to be there and I really don’t want to let them down. I did tell them I would be there and you wouldn’t force me to break my word, would you?”

Rufus smiled inwardly as he listened to this last, futile attempt by Osborne to extract himself from what he knew were to be the painful consequences of his actions. But he had no intention of letting Osborne off the hook; the lad had been caught, fair and square, breaking the rules and Rufus had every intention on putting what he had just learned from the head-boy into immediate practice.  Osborne minor’s  arse was destined to be the first of a regular stream of boys that year who would be invited to sample what was rapidly to become Rufus’s undoubted expertise with the cane.   

“Osborne, supper is a mere fifteen minutes away and I fail to see that anything you wish to say to your friends cannot wait until you are all at table together. So young-man, get a move on; shift you arse, boy, and go and stand in front of the library door, where I shall join you shortly.”

Osborne finally capitulated and went and stood outside the library door in nervous expectation of what was about to happen to him. Rufus entered the library to find three boys sitting there reading. Protocol required that he ask them to leave and he then invited the unfortunate Osborne to enter to meet his fate.

Of course the three lads, having been kicked out of the library, knew that their exiting and Osborne’s entry meant only one thing: Rothery, the new junior prefect, was going to beat arse; an arse that on this occasion, clearly was going to be furnished by courtesy of Osborne minor.

This piece of intelligence flashed quickly round the school so that by the time the boys sat down to supper everyone knew that Rothery had beaten Osborne minor.  And as Osborne and Munford, the head-boy’s fag, both chose to eat their supper standing at table, it was clear that not one, but two boys had just been beaten and it was still only the fifth day of the new term! The message was loud and clear: the prefects really did mean business; so caveat puer if you valued your backside!

“Osborne, as you may or may not be aware, running in the corridors, a forbidden act in which you have unfortunately just indulged, carries a mandatory punishment of six stroke of the cane in retribution for having broken one of the most important rules of this school.”

Then without asking Osborne if he had anything more to say, Rufus picked up the cane,  pointed with it to the chair and said: “Take of your jacket and go and stand behind the chair; then drop your trousers and underpants and let them fall to the floor around your ankles;  then bend across the back of the chair, place your hands on its seat and stick your arse well into the air and remain quite still in that position until I tell  you may get up.”

“I shall then give you the pleasure of experiencing six strokes of the cane in retribution for your sins, during which time you will not, under any circumstances, attempt to touch your buttocks. Oh and one final point Osborne; during the punishment you will maintain your buttocks in a relaxed state. Do not clench them or I shall be obliged to recommence your punishment from the beginning. Is all that clear, Osborne?”

If Osborne had been seriously uneasy when told to go to the library, after listening to Rufus’s instructions, he was now terrified.  Osborne had been through the normal prep-school mill and, like most boys at that time, had had his bottom swished several times; but until now, never actually beaten properly on the bare.

And that was was precisely what Rufus Rothery was proposing to do to him: to cane his arse properly and completely naked. It was just too awful a prospect to contemplate.  And so he made one last ditch attempt to save at least something from the imminent disaster.  “Oh Rothery, I really am sorry for running in the corridor and I know that I have to be punished for it. But please Rothery, could I not at least keep my underpants on. You see I have never ever been beaten on my bare bum before.  So please Rothery, please at least let me keep my underpants on.”

It is not so much that the skimpy fabric of any type of underpants much alleviates the pain of the cane as it bites into a lad’s buttocks, but rather that the boy being punished is spared the embarrassment of baring his all to his tormentor. It goes without saying that Osborne’s plea fell on stony ground and was roundly rejected.

“Osborne, boys throughout this entire school, from the moment they enter the first form right through to the final day when they leave the upper sixth, are all beaten on the bare if they deserve it. And let me just tell you that not only does your arse deserve to be beaten, but it will be very soundly beaten on the bare as tradition demands. So kindly do as I say and present to me your bare buttocks over the chair in the next ten seconds. Come on boy; move it; I don’t like to be kept waiting.”

A few moments later, Rufus found himself facing, for the first time ever, a pair of undefiled buttocks which he was about to stripe with the cane. And just for a moment he felt a resurgence of his earlier fear flash through his mind: that he would make a mess of performing his first beating. But then, reassured by the instructions and practical demonstration he had just been given by the head-boy, he pushed his doubts aside and prepared to give Osborne arse the first stroke of the cane he would ever deliver.

It was a unique moment for Rufus; never again would this moment exist; it was like losing his sexual virginity: a life-changing event which was which was still to come for him. In both cases whether being beaten for the first time on the bare or losing one’s own sexual virginity, one second one still had it and the next second it was gone, never to be retrieved.  Like so many things in life, as the cane mated with Osborne’s naked skin for the first time, with that inimitable crack of well-seasoned rattan on a boy’s bare arse, a howl of pain from the unfortunate recipient testified to its undoubted success.

Rufus, mindful of the lesson he had just received from the head-boy, then went on and gave Osborne five more swingeing, well placed strokes. By the time he had finished, Osborne’s arse was sporting six neat, deeply ridged, parallel cuts of the cane, which were already a deep-crimson red. The lad was clearly in agony and as Rufus stood there admiring his handiwork, he mentally chalked up his maiden beating as a success. How very easy it had been!

“It’s all over now, Osborne, so you may get up and put back on our clothes.  Let that be a lesson to you not to run in the corridors ever again. Try to look on the bright side of things. You will be the hero of your schoolmates when they see your magnificently striped backside. So you may now leave and go to the common-room or directly to supper as you wish.”

Rufus Rothery felt quite elated with the effective way in which he had handled his first beating. It had, however not escaped his attention that his cock, which had started to stiffen as he he has watched the head-boy thrash his fag, had how now risen to the occasion and was fully erect, pushing firmly against the crotch of his trousers. This was the first real spontaneous intimation to Rufus, as was the case with many men, that the act of flagellation was sexually arousing.

His first feeling was one of embarrassment as his large, hard member thrust itself to the fore; but this was followed by a feeling of immense pleasure accompanied by one of guilt, as he realised that he had actually enjoyed beating Munford’s arse. And it was this acceptance of the fact that he had actually enjoyed wielding the cane that was to condition much of his life from now on.

So that later that same evening when he was to beat both Barker and Havers, any feelings of technical inadequacy about handling the cane that he had previously harboured, had vanished; and, to his shame as he secretly admitted to himself, he found himself really looking forward to making the two lads suffer for their misdeeds.

But facts are facts and cannot be avoided and thus it was that the seed of tyranny was sown in the psyche of Rufus Rothery: a seed which over the years was to germinate and turn Rufus into a tyrannical headmaster. But we are still many years from that, so first things first.

That evening turned out not only to be the consolidation of Rufus’s initial embrace of the pleasure he got from using the cane, but also an introduction into what was to become his school sex-life. It was not so much the fact of seeing young lads half-naked which aroused erotic feelings in Rufus – turned him on, as we would say today – as the physical act of beating their naked arses, which aroused him sexually.

The simple fact of the matter was that like many boys, Rufus got considerable satisfaction from the painful misfortunes of his schoolmates. Schadenfreude – pleasure at the misfortunes of others – was a feeling Rufus had shared with his schoolmates, whenever they had viewed the roasted arse of one of their number.

But the ability, legally to administer the pain leading to that sore arse, was given to only a selected few boys, the prefects, who were authorised to beat their schoolmates. And when the prefect had that inbuilt sadistic streak, as Rufus himself had, then it is easy to see how such people were on the slippery slope towards tyranny.

That evening, Rufus had every intention of exercising his newly acquired authority to the full; he made Barker and Havers take of their trousers and pants completely and got the pair of them each bent across the back of a chair, each with his naked arse in the air awaiting his onslaught with the cane. Tradition dictated that when prefects were using the library for what was euphemistically referred to as correctional purposes, all boys, other than prefects, left the room. 

But on this evening, Rufus found himself, by chance, alone with the two nervously-unhappy, arse-naked penitents bent across the chairs. He was just about to give a trembling Barker his first of six cuts with the cane, when the head-boy, Nigel Kingston entered the room totally unannounced.

“Good evening Rothery; as you told me earlier that you were proposing to beat these two young miscreants this evening, I thought I would just drop in and see, in my capacity as head-boy, if everything was proceeding satisfactorily. But I see you are already well on your way; so do not let me interrupt you; please continue with your unhappy (sic!) duty.”

Rufus then went ahead and gave each of the two boys, six strokes of the cane. Under the watchful eye of his mentor, the head-boy, he followed to the letter, the instructions given to him earlier that day.  However he alternated strokes between the two boys, which added a certain drama to the proceedings. The success of Rufus’s ministrations was confirmed by the regular howls of pain emitted by the two lads as the beatings progressed. 

By the time he had finished, each lad was sporting what was usually vulgarly referred to by the entire school, as a well-beaten arse. Rufus was just about to motion to the two lads to stand up and get dressed when the head-boy intervened.  “You two boys, stand up and face me and put your hands on your heads whilst I address you.  Correct me if I am wrong, but Rothery caught the pair of you sneaking back into the school after an unauthorised expedition into the town and neither of you was wearing your school cap.”

“In a word, not only were you were absent without leave, but in not wearing your school caps you were breaking two of the schools most sacred (sic!) rules, each of which carries a penalty of six strokes of the cane. Now as Rothery is only a junior prefect at present, he is authorised to give only six strokes of the cane to any boy on any one occasion, a task, to judge from your expressions of appreciation during your beatings, I think you will agree, he has accomplished admirably this evening.”

‘So the fact that you were caught in flagrante by a junior prefect has, due to a technicality, allowed you to escape from what by rights, should have been a twelve-stroke beating. However, since earlier this evening I learned, quite by chance, of your offence, in my capacity a head-boy, I have decided that I feel morally obliged to intervene: to right a wrong which has been forced upon Rothery due to his present status as a junior prefect. I have, therefore, decided that I shall myself give each of you a further six cuts of the cane, thereby bringing up your total to the mandated cumulative punishment for your two offences.”

The two boys first looked utterly dumbstruck listening to this orotundly officious, over-the-top oration; a look which quickly turned to one of terror when they realised what the head-boy had in store for them. Neither lad uttered a single word in protest as they silently obeyed Kingston’s order to bend across the chairs again. Rufus himself was totally surprised by the head-boy’s announcement, as he had had no idea at all of his intentions when he entered the library. 

In fact, neither he himself nor the two young offenders had ever even imagined that anyone would come back and increase the severity of their punishment. But as Rufus reflected on the head-boy’s nickname, the Killer, a name he had earned due to his brutal efficiency with the cane as a junior prefect, it was not surprising that he now fully intended to use the almost unlimited power that came with his present position as head-boy over his schoolmates. 

Unfortunately, the hierarchical system which reigned at St. Olaf’s (and at many other northern public schools at that time) gave the head-boy carte blanche when it came to discipline.  Just how appropriate the head-boy’s nickname, Killer, was, was now illustrated graphically in the way he administered those six additional strokes to each of the lads’ already blistered backsides. 

Just the fact of an additional six was bad enough; but he systematically doubled every stroke which Rufus had made. With consummate accuracy he placed each of his stinging additional strokes, precisely on one of Rufus’s original cuts.

So at the end of the day, the two lads were sporting ostensibly six cut arses, which were hurting like the fires of hell, as each of the six, visible stripes was the result of two strokes of the cane.  Not surprisingly, the two lads hobbled off to bed in a flood of tears to show their super-well-beaten-arses to their schoolmates. If ever two lads had earned a lesson the hard way, Barker and Havers surely had on that fateful evening.

CHAPTER 7

“Well Rothery, I think we can safely say that that was a job well done.  If they have any sense, which is doubtful, that pair of miscreants will think twice before going into town without an exeat.  I think you can can chalk up your first week as a junior prefect as a great success as I hear that you beat yet another boy shortly after leaving my study this  afternoon, which means you have beaten three boys in your first week as a junior prefect.  That, my friend, is some record to beat; no pun intended!”

“You are doubtless familiar with the mock Latin expression: illegitimi nil caborundum, of which an apocryphally incorrect translation is: don’t let the bastards grind you down. Well I think for prefects in our position of authority in the school, a more positive version of that sentiment is more appropriate to the disciplinary actions we are expected to visit on our schoolmates. Latin is not my strong suit, but it seems to me that parvi illegitimi carborundum: which in my translation reads: grind the little bastards down, is a more appropriate maxim to invoke when dealing with our young miscreants.”

“In my view it is the job of each junior prefect to see that the young blighters of the first and second forms are kept in order and if they break the rules – which the do – to whack their pert, plump, little arses for them.  We prefects are in a privileged position in that we have the back-up of the cane to aid us in exacting retribution from our schoolmates for their sins. So we should, as exhorted by our Headmaster, not hesitate to use it: I know I never did last year when I was just a junior myself.”

“However, I suspect after your performance today, that I am preaching to the converted.  I have to say that you do seem to have got off to a cracking (sic) good start! I take my metaphorical hat off to you Rothery as with three beaten arses under our belt in one day, you have outdone even my performance in my first week as a junior prefect.  Clearly, young-man, you have a great year of arse whacking ahead of you. And just think, next year as a senior prefect, what the future holds for you. In a word, Rothery, the next two years at St. Olaf’s are your oyster.”

It is not difficult to see, how a man with the inherent but hitherto un-awakened, sadistic tendencies of Rufus Rothery, listening to the blood-thirsty exhortations of a head-boy of similar, if not even more pronounced inclinations to whack arse, should succumb to his worst instincts and inflict punishments of unjustifiable severity on his classmates whenever the opportunity arose.

And that is, of course, precisely what Rufus Rothery did. It goes without saying that the six strokes maximum, the limit imposed on junior prefects, was the generally accepted norm for any offence committed by anyone, whichever junior prefect was involved.  No junior prefect ever gave less than six strokes however slight the offence.

Not surprisingly in view of the friendship which developed between Rufus Rothery and Nigel Kingston, the then head-boy, two young men who shared a similar sadistic streak, and the willingness of the latter to intervene and give supplementary strokes on request, Rufus Rothery rapidly developed the reputation of being the new junior prefect to steer clear of; six cut beatings by Rothery, had a nasty habit of unexpectedly turning into something much worse, thanks to the frequent and willing, topping-up, interventions of the Killer head-boy.  

Under Nigel Kingston’s verbal guidance, Rufus rapidly established for himself a terrifying reputation when it came to the nightly dormitory inspections, a task which he shared with his co-junior prefect in Plato House, the house to which he himself had belonged since entering the school aged thirteen. Plato House, had two dormitories for each year’s entry, each sleeping ten boys. So in all, Rufus and his co-prefect were responsible for keeping order in four dorms, two for first year boys and two for second year boys: a total of forty boys in all, all whom were looking to make mischief  and create their own little chaos whenever they thought they could get away with it.

Rufus kept the cane he had been given by the Headmaster in his own study bedroom located in Plato House. Lights-out was at eight-thirty for the first formers and nine for the second formers, by which times all boys were supposed to be in bed. Any boy caught out of bed after lights out by a prefect on dorm duty that night was liable to find himself going back to bed nursing a very hot backside acquired in full view of his dorm-mates.

As Nigel Kingston pointed out to Rufus, the two first year dorms  were a great potential source of cane-fodder for the attentive junior prefect,, What usually happened was that the duty prefect saw that the boys were in bed with the lights out at the ordained times.  But the secret was to trawl back down the corridor a little later to see if anything was stirring in any of the dorms with a view to catching the occupants red-handed at some illicitly nefarious activity or another.  The aim of course, was to collect a few backsides to thrash there and then.

Over the course of Rufus’s first term he was regularly able to find some boy or other who had chanced his luck after lights-out and got out of bed to do whatever it is that young lads do if left to their own devices. But whatever the offence, the result was always the same same. The lad in question was made to put his pillow at the foot of the bed, take off his pyjama trousers, bend across the pillow and take six on the bare for his pains.

Rufus was a bit miffed to miss out on what was a sort of royal flush of arses to beat, when his co-prefect caught the whole of one of the second form dorms in a pillow fight half an hour after lights out.  Retribution was immediate and painful as he thrashed all ten lads on the bare before sending them all tearful back to bed to nurse their blistered arses. Rufus fund himself getting hard just at the thought of what he had missed out on. Just think of it: ten naked arses to thrash; six strokes each; sixty resounding cuts, one after the other.  It truly was the stuff legends were made of!

But Rufus too had an occasional triumph which led to his thrashing of half the dorm. One evening he heard noise well after lights out in one of the first form dorms. He saw under the door that the light was on. He opened the door and entered, cane in hand, a habit he had adopted on his inspection trips. 

To his surprise he found four boys sitting together on one bed, bold as brass, playing some board game or other. No one else was actually asleep, but only the four engaged in the game were out of their beds.  This was typical of what happened. The lads thought that the nightly inspection was over and had risked it, putting back on the lights to play whatever game it was they were at

“The four off you, pyjama pants off, put your top pillow at the end of your bed and I want to see all four of you, arse naked, bent across it before I can count to ten.”

But now came the great revelation: quite against the rules that all boys wear only their pyjamas in bed two of the lads were wearing their underpants.

“You two, get your underpants off immediately. Don’t you know that sleeping in your underwear is firstly very unsanitary and secondly strictly forbidden in this school.”

At that moment Rufus wished that he had more than the statutory six cuts to give the two boys in question, but as he had not, he decided to make their punishment as painful as possible by doubling the strokes. So all four lads got the customary six cuts, but two of them really came of much worse. As anyone who has had the misfortune to have his backside beaten, with one stroke doubled exactly by a second, knows the pain is utterly excruciating. Just imagine how the two lads who were treated to three doubled strokes by Rufus felt by the time they were told to get up and get back into their beds.

But then it occurred to Rufus that if two of the lads had been wearing underpants to sleep, was it not also possible that among the other six boys who were still in their beds watching with that prurient, malicious interest their dorm-mates being beaten might also be breaking the same rule.

“The rest of you boys, out of bed and drop your pyjama trousers and let me see your arses.”

To his delight, he discovered that no less than five of the ten occupants of the dorm had been sleeping wearing their underpants.  Pointing with his cane at the three newly discovered offenders, whose sorry faces already indicated that they knew the fate their arses were about undergo.

“Well, you three, I think you all know what is to happen now, so put your top pillow over the bottom of your bed and get your deserving arses across it. Come on boys; jump to it; I want to see three arses ready and eager to keep their assignation with the cane in five seconds.”

The three new offenders were obviously horrified by what was about to happen to them, but they had no alternative but to obey Rufus’s order.  And so yet again the whole dorm echoed to the crack of the cane as Rufus unrelentingly gave each lad a three on three beating. When he finally left the dorm that night, it was to the music of seven boys sobbing themselves tearfully to sleep.

Having put the first of the two new-boy dorms to rest, Rufus, with the bit now firmly between his teeth, decided to investigate the second of the of the first year dorms. As he opened the door he saw at the light was still off, but he sensed that the occupants were all still awake, having heard what was happening to their neighbours in the adjacent room. 

He switched on the light and said:  “Right boys; this is an arse inspection. I want the whole lot of you out of bed immediately. Stand to attention beside your bed and lower the trousers of your pyjamas, so that I can see your backsides.”

The boys obeyed; but four of them were very hesitant in dropping their pyjama bottoms. Their guilty faces said it all as they were each wearing underpants beneath their pyjamas. So the remaining occupants of the second dorm were treated to the spectacle of seeing four of their dorm-mates have their arses shredded by a very determined and ruthlessly efficient Rufus.

One thing was sure however: Rufus’s actions, motivated partly by his own desire to whack as many backsides as possible that evening, did have a salutary effect on the behaviour of the younger boys, all of whom realised as a result of the beatings in the two dorms, that they either toe the line and obey the rules or find themselves attempting to get to sleep accompanied by a very arse.

By the end of his first term as a prefect, Rufus had already gained a formidable reputation as being the most ruthless of the junior prefects in his treatment of the younger boys. Both in his daily life in the school, boys whom he caught breaking even some minor rule, found themselves summoned to the library where their backsides were soundly thrashed.

And it was the same in the evenings in Plato House. Never had there ever been a junior house-prefect, who so assiduously carried out his duties of seeing that the first and second formers toed the line. 

As that first term ended for the Christmas holidays, Rufus felt very satisfied with what I suppose one night well call his caning average: the number of boys he managed to beat each week.  His victims, which for many of them their supposed crimes did not warrant the severity of punishment which Rufus regularly dispensed, seized upon his name and with that typical flight of alliterative imagination so common amongst schoolboys, nicknamed him, most appropriately, Ruthless Rufus.

So by the end of that first term it is safe to say that among all the prefects, both junior and senior, Rufus was the most feared and most hated by the majority of the first and second formers at St. Olaf’s. But also by the end of that first term, the duo, Rufus Rothery plus Nigel Kingston, the gruesome-twosome as they became to be known, were totally feared by the entire school. 

Nigel Kingston, the head-boy, was considered by all and sundry as the absolute, quintessential bastard when it came to using the cane. Add to the beatings he dispensed his own right, those top-up strokes he regularly added to the beatings performed by Ruthless Rufus, the whole school sighed metaphorically with relief when the end of the school year arrived and Nigel Kingston left St. Olaf’s to go on to university, taking with him the doubtful distinction of being the most hated head-boy in living memory.

Alas when the new school year dawned, the boys realised they had counted their chickens before they were hatched.  To their horror, the Headmaster announced at the first daily assembly of the new school year, that Rufus Rothery, Ruthless Rufus, was to be head-boy for the present year.  The announcement was met with a deafening silence as its significance sank in and the boys realised that in losing the hated Kingston, they might somehow, just have gone from bad to worse

In replacing Kingston as head-boy, Ruthless Rufus already enjoyed – if that is the right expression – the reputation he had developed in his first year as a junior prefect. His caning skills were already legendary throughout the school and his willingness to wield the cane made him the most feared of any of the then prefects, juniors and seniors included  He was reckoned, by a good margin to be the strictest of disciplinarians and the hardest of hard caners among the prefects and masters.  Only the Headmaster himself was viewed with greater fear than Rufus Rothery; and that was before he became head-boy!

Rufus had already been apprised by the Headmaster at the end of the previous term of his elevation to this, the highest position of honour available to boys in the school.  He had been as stunned as the rest of the boys were to be, when he had been told by the Headmaster of his elevation to the top position in the hierarchy of prefects. 

But given his own penchant for severity, he had every intention of using his elevated position to indulge himself and make his final  year at St. Olaf’s a memorable one, both in terms of the self-satisfaction  he got when wielding the cane  and the Schadenfreude he felt when he imparted pain to his classmates. The Headmaster had, quite unknowingly, provided Rufus with another step in his progress towards tyranny.

CHAPTER 8

But to come back for a moment to that conversation between Rufus and the head-boy immediately following the beating of Barker and Havers in the library, Nigel Kingston had other things on his mind concerning his fast burgeoning relationship with Rufus Rothery. And as will now be revealed, what was to result from the growing friendship between the two young-men was greatly to influence Rufus’s future life.

Nigel Kingston said to Rufus: “Well Rothery, as I already observed to you, you did very well this evening.”  But then he introduced a totally new note into the conversation: “I would say from observing you as you wielded the cane, that you were really enjoying yourself, shredding the arses of those two young miscreants, Barker and Havers. But not to put too fine a point on it, I saw from the way your cock was tenting the crotch of your trousers as you wielded the rod of justice that you were completely aroused by what you were doing.”

“Now far be it for me to criticise you, for I have to admit that I felt exactly the same emotions myself. In fact, to be honest, I find myself fully aroused every time I beat a boy’s naked arse. But I wonder how you feel now, right after the event.  Don’t you feel the need to get physical with yourself to relieve the erotic tension which has built up? I know that after my additional cuts, I do.”

Rufus was taken totally off guard by this very direct question. He was still acutely aware that he still had more than the remnants of the erection he had developed as he thrashed the two lads, which had been intensified as he watched the head-boy deliver  his additional cuts. So he saw immediately that Kingston’s analysis of the situation was correct.  Rufus was acutely aware that he desperately needed to jerk himself off to relieve the tension which had automatically built up as he had thrashed the tow lads and which had been been intensified by Kingston’s additional strokes.

He also knew that the last few times he himself had been beaten when he was fifteen or so, that he had finished up with a rock-hard erection and had then gone off somewhere private and relieved his feelings by jerking himself off.  So as he could see, from his own personal experience, the act of being beaten and the act of beating someone else, had the dame erotic effect on him: he finished up with a rock-hard erection and needed some sort of sexual relief. Like most lads of his age, he regularly masturbated in his bed, taking care to catch his emissions in what was generally called a wank rag. In his case was a series of handkerchiefs which he then put in to be washed with his laundry.

He also knew that what was obliquely referred to as self abuse was frowned upon by the powers that be. But pretty well all the boys in his dorm wanked under the bed clothes on on a regular basis. So, on this occasion, with his cock demanding immediate attention, left to his own devices he would have gone off to his own room and jerked himself off with a vengeance.

All such traditional sexual activities, typical of public school boys of his age, Rufus had hitherto performed strictly in private. All boys, in any dorm, knew what everyone else was doing, but there was no communal wanking. It was just too dangerous, as dorm inspections were religiously and rigorously carried out by the prefects and any infractions detected – as they frequently were – led to immediate, on-the-spot, bare-arse roastings. In fact, Rufus was already looking forward to his dorm duty as house prefect, with the opportunity it offered him to beat arse on the spot.

In reality, the nearest most of the lads ever got to group sexual activities was when one of their number showed them the stripes on his blistered arse after a beating.  This passive act for the observers nevertheless had the effect of simulating them sexually. Most of the boys who gazed in awe and wonder, coupled with that omnipresent element of fear that their own arses might meet the same fate, found that their cocks had, somehow, automatically become erect and were demanding immediate attention.

This was first intimation to most of of them that here was one part of their body – and a very vital part – over which they had no direct control. And that was exactly the state in which Rufus now found himself. His cock, exercising that mind of its own, had remained resolutely and defiantly hard despite his wish to the contrary.

Rufus, having no experience of anything even vaguely smacking of sexual intercourse with another person, was somewhat of a loss in knowing what to say to Kingston in response to his question. What exactly did he mean by getting physical? But Kingston had been so direct: referring to Rufus’s cock tenting his pants and his own sexual stirrings, it was clear that he had some joint activity in mind; but what? 

It has to be said that in the earlier part of the twentieth century where this story is set, all the sexual activities, about which we today talk freely, were cloaked in discrete mystery.  In fact, cloaked can hardly describe the general blanket lack of information on the simple facts of life, let alone the various sexual practices based on the basic sex act: practices that were just as common then as they are today, but which were then never spoken of in polite society. 

So teenagers at that time were much less well informed of the facts of life and of sexual practices in general, all of which we today, a century later, take for granted. The lack of sexual knowledge, other than wanking, which Rufus displayed, seemed to come automatically as an act pre-ordained by nature, was then the norm.

What was evident was the fact that Nigel Kingston, one year older than his protégé, for that is how he already secretly saw Rufus, had somehow extended his knowledge of sex and was now intent on initiating Rufus him into the unbridled joys of sex beyond solo masturbation.  

Having obtained no clear answer to his question to Rufus about his need to get physical, Kingston took the proverbial bull by the horns and said: “Come on, Rothery, don’t dither. Let’s go to my study and have a wank together, followed by a fag and a drink together before bed.”

Rufus was somewhat taken aback by the baldness of the head-boy’s suggestion. It is quite true that left to his own devices Rufus would have gone off and jerked himself off in private as he was fully aware of the pleasurable orgasm that his personal, five-fingered lover would generate. But he was a bit shocked to hear the head-boy’s suggestion that they go off and wank together and that they then go on to break two of the most sacred rules of the school. Both smoking and drinking were strictly forbidden and any boy caught indulging in either act was subject to a monumental beating by the Headmaster and possible expulsion if caught. 

But when Rufus expressed his fears, Kingston said: “You are quite right, Rothery, the dangers are there. But breaking the rules is exactly what makes life exciting and the secret is not to get caught at it –whatever it might be.  Look at it this way; if we caught any of our schoolmates at it, then it would be our duty as prefects to shred their arses. But when we do that we are not, in fact, punishing them for what they were doing, whatever that might be. We are simply punishing them for being stupid enough to allow themselves to be caught in the act.”

“Look, what the eye does not see, the heart does not grieve. So the art of breaking the rules is to make jolly well sure that you don’t get caught. So come on, Rothery, live dangerously for once and enjoy life. We are both over eighteen years of age and I always feel like a good wank after I have whacked someone. Alliteration apart, whacking followed by wanking seem to go hand-in-hand to me.”

“So as I have already said, I can see from the way your trousers look that you are desperately in need of a wank yourself, so why don’t we enjoy a wank together?  Look, no one is going to catch us at it behind the locked door of my study. And anyway, there is always a certain thrill in knowing that you are breaking the rules and the possibility of dire consequences if you get caught. But have no fear; we shall not get caught. Come on, Rothery, you know that you need a wank just as much as I do. So put your fears aside and let’s do it together.”

And that was how Rufus, aged eighteen had his first introduction to the banal sexual act of masturbating with another man, an act which takes place all the time among older boys, all of whom are really young men, who are starved of female company in public schools.

He and the head-boy began their joint effort by each of them jerking himself off behind the locked door of Kingston’s study.  But the head-boy, who had taken a great liking to his younger homologue, had no intention of stopping there, now that he had seduced – for that is exactly what he had done – Rufus into lowering his guard. So in no time at all, Kingston had Rufus and himself naked together and in, what was, for Rufus, his first true sexual encounter.

Kingston, who, unbeknown to Rufus at that moment, was actively gay – as we would say today – desperately wanted to have sex with his younger protégé. He began by holding Rufus close to him and, quite boldly kissed him full on the mouth.  Then he gradually descended with his lips down Rufus’s naked body, visiting both nipples on his way, until he arrived at the first of his first principal objectives: Rufus’s cock. By this time, Rufus was again fully erect with all the attention his body had been receiving.

Rufus, by now totally in the thrall of his first sexual encounter,  offered no resistance as his first-ever sex partner knelt in front of him and took his cock into his mouth. As Kingston gently sucked Rufus’s cock, Rufus, new to sex as he was, quickly climaxed and gave Kingston his creamy load of sperm full in his face.  But now, totally seduced as he was by Kingston, Rufus allowed himself to be led docilely to the head-boy’s bed without even realising what was about to happen to him. 

Kingston, who was himself a fully-experienced operator when it came to anal sex, quickly flipped Rufus onto his stomach and applied a generous dose of baby-oil to his partner’s anus. Then, with no hesitation whatsoever, he spread Rufus’s legs, knelt down between them and pressed the head of his cock against his anal entry. And that is how, within seconds, Rufus took his first, ever cock up his arse and lost his anal virginity to the head-boy, Nigel Kingston.

As Kingston thrust his sizeable tool into Rufus’s anus, Rufus felt a sharp stab of pain as he took the full length of the hard, invading phallus inside of himself. He let out a slight moan of pain, but Kingston pressed on regardless.  But once Kingston started his thrusting, giving Rufus his first ever anal fuck, Rufus found that in spite of the pain, he was actually enjoying the experience of what was to prove the first of many sexual couplings between Kingston and him that school year.

Things had gone at break-neck speed from what had been really little more than a rather distant, casual acquaintanceship as schoolmates, via complicity in beating two boys, to full sexual intimacy.  As they lay there together in Kingston’s bed Rufus found himself luxuriating in his new-found state. He had long known that he found other men more attractive than women. But now that he was in bed with – to coin a name – his lover, he knew that the die had been cast and that his life would never be the same again. In his own heart, he already knew that his sexual future would lie with other men.

Rufus lay there with his own cock still rock-hard, looking longingly and, it has to be said, somewhat lasciviously, at the naked figure of Kingston, the man who had just relieved him of his anal virginity.  He had been totally carried away by the way Kingston had fucked him without any preliminary discussion of his intentions. And now as he looked at Kingston, admiring his athletically muscled body, he felt in himself the urge to continue and complete the experience, which he realised was not yet complete. 

At that moment, Rufus was still in what might best be described as a state of suspended, aroused, sexual readiness. He knew he wanted something else to happen as he did not want his first true sexual experience to end there. But as a newcomer to sex he really had no idea how to take the next step. He had been the passive partner in what had happened so far in that he had been fucked.  But was that to be it for now? Was the business over as far as Kingston was concerned or did he want more action and if so, what?

Kingston came to his rescue by suddenly saying: “Well, Rufus, go on then. Do it!” This was the first time he had called Rufus by his first name a fact which indicated a change in their relationship. “You know you want to do the same to me. Just look at your cock. It’s is telling you quite clearly what it wants to do. So why deny it its God-given purpose in life which is to fuck. So go on! Fuck me. That’s what your cock is there for! You know you want to. And frankly, Rufus, I’m really in the mood to have my arse fucked.”

Kingston then continued quite brutally: “You know, Rufus, I often feel like getting my own hole shafted after I have just fucked someone myself.  So go on, Rufus, take the plunge, live dangerously for once. I know you want to fuck me; you know you want to fuck me; I have just told you that I would like to be fucked; so what more do you need? Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. I’m offering you my arse on a plate, so just go ahead and fuck it!”

Kingston then stood up, picked up the bottle of baby-oil, which he handed to Rufus before lying sown on his back, spreading his legs to expose his vital port of entry and saying: “Well, go on then, Rufus, you know the drill. Just lube my hole up well and then away you go.  And, Rufus, by the way, in case no one has ever told you, you do have a very desirable piece of meat between your legs. So don’t hesitate; just stick it to me and give me as hard a fuck as I have just given you. Go on Rufus; everyone has to have a first time and your first time is right now. So just go ahead, stick your cock up my arse and fuck me as hard as you can.”

If ever a man had called a spade a shovel, it was Kingston at that moment. And so, encouraged by Kingston’s brutal exhortations, Rufus did exactly as he had been told. And it was all true; Kingston had summed it all up exactly. Rufus knew that he desperately wanted to fuck Kingston just as much as Kingston wanted to be fucked. So the two of them had one hell of a return bout of anal sex, as Rufus surrendered his final vestige of virginity to Kingston by thrusting his cock into his partner’s inviting, and well-lubricated anus.

Like so many young men, nervous as hell as he prepared to penetrate another man for the very first time, Rufus found that initial entry somewhat intimidating. He felt Kingston’s anal sphincter resisting the head of his penis as he thrust himself against the resistance of a muscular anal sphincter.  For a moment, it seemed to him that his partner’s entry port was refusing him entry.

But then, Kingston, ever ready with advice,  told Rufus to thrust harder which he did and suddenly Rufus found his cock sliding smoothly into the innermost depths of his partner. The sensation he experienced was utterly delightful: quite beyond anything he had ever felt sexually in his lone wankings. For a few moments he luxuriated in that moment of domination and feeling of intense satisfaction which the fact of being deep inside of his partner gave him. His momentary idyll was broken by a brusque order from Kingston.

“Well, Rufus, now that you have managed to shaft me, do please get on with it and give me really good, hard fuck, as that is exactly what I need right now. Come on, Rufus, don’t keep me waiting any longer.”

For a moment Rufus hesitated, but then he discovered, as do most young men when they indulge in their very first act of copulation, whether gay or straight, that he needed no further urging. Nature told him instinctively what he had to do; and so, he set about doing it with considerable vigour. For a totally inexperienced young-man, who had, been thrown, completely un-warned in at the deep end of his first sexual experience, it has to be said that Rufus showed an amazing aptitude for the task in front of him.

I use the word task purely figuratively, for as Rufus quickly discovered what he was required to do to satisfy his partner came quite naturally and was a real pleasure rather than a task. And as ever, the act of copulation quickly led him that all-too-short moment of exquisite, orgasmic pleasure as he suddenly exploded deep inside of his partner. He began with a few, tentative, gentle, in-out thrust with his cock but then quickly settled into a rhythm of forceful strokes which became successively ever longer as he went 

To his great credit, he practically withdrew himself completely from  Kingston’s anus before making that last powerful thrust which brought him to his first experience of an orgasm which he had not induced by wanking himself off. For Rufus, this was probably the greatest and certainly the most pleasurable moment in his life to date.

As he lay there on top of Kingston, his cock still deeply embedded in his partner’s arse, Rufus felt totally fulfilled.  All the more so, as that final thrust which had given him his own orgasm, had also brought Kingston to his own climax. With his own cock still deep inside of his partner in what we know today as the mission position, he suddenly found himself bathed in a mini-tsunami of sperm which Kingston ejaculated with considerable vigour over himself and Rufus.

Rufus had suddenly acceded to his manhood in a totally unplanned manner, but found he had loved every moment of it.  But he already knew, after that first fuck when he had given his own penis its maiden experience with another man, that he was destined to be what we today would call a top. That inbuilt streak of sadism in his nature was already dictating to him that he must be the dominant partner in any sexual relationship.  And to dominate his partner, he must always be the one who fucked and his partner, whoever that might be, must be someone who was willing to be fucked. OK, from time to time if needs must and the occasion demanded it, Rufus saw that he had to allow his partner of the moment access to his anus. But basically he just knew that he had to dominate his partner in any sexual context. In a word, Rufus had to be the top: the guy who did the fucking

“Well, well, well, Rufus! Still waters run deep, as the saying has it. You know Rufus, after that performance it is hard to believe that that was your first fuck ever: that you were exercising your cock on another man for the very first time. All I can say, Rufus, is that I take my hat off to you. You have a natural aptitude when it comes to copulating with another man and I promise you that I enjoyed very moment of what you have just done to me as I can see that you yourself did.”

“So why don’t you prove my diagnosis correct and that what you just did to me is not a fluke, by giving me a repeat performance? Come on, Rufus, how about it? Are you up to fucking me again right now?

Of course, the challenging words: are you up to, would have aroused the mettle of any man and Rufus was no exception. And so he snapped at the bait and Kingston’s arse took a monumental, second beating from Rufus’s cock, during which any doubts that Rufus was not up to it, were laid to rest.

“My God, Rufus, you really have got the bit between your teeth. In my view you have little more to learn about butt fucking: Frankly, you’re a natural; and I really do mean that; I am not saying it to flatter  you! So there you are. You have now tasted, and I am sure appreciated, what is, without any doubt, the greatest pleasure known to the human male. It is often described as the toy which never fails to please, which means that it is one of those rare acts which will give us pleasure throughout our entire lives.”

“Just let me say, Rufus, that I am delighted to have had the privilege of showing you the light. I can but hope that you have enjoyed yourself as much as I have and that we can look forward to a year of – how shall I best put it? – frequent and intense copulation.”

Well, as you might well imagine, given the affinity which the two young men had not only for sex but also for wielding the cane, Rufus  Rothery, the newly anointed  junior prefect and Nigel Kingston, the head-boy, fucked each other on a regular basis through the three terms of that school-year.  Rufus took every opportunity to beat arse and by the end of the year, under his nick-name, Ruthless Rufus, a sobriquet which the vigour of his actions with the cane amply justified, he had achieved the distinction of being the most feared and hated of the junior prefects. His reputation as being the hardest and most frequent caner among the junior prefects was considerably enhanced by the regular supplementary interventions of the head-boy, whose arm was ever ready to supply additional strokes above the six allowed by a junior prefect.  This was a limitation, which in Rufus’s view, cramped his style.

As for Nigel, well his reputation with the cane had been already well-established at the beginning of the year. When he left St. Olaf’s at the end of the school-year there was a general, silent sigh of relief from the boys that he was finally gone. But as already mentioned earlier, the relief was short lived when the whole school learned that the dreaded and universally hated Rufus Rothery – Ruthless Rufus – was the new head-boy for the coming year.

CHAPTER 9

The new school year dawned in early September. Rufus Rothery installed himself in the spacious suite of two rooms which the head-boy of St. Olaf’s was accorded. Every sixth former each had his own study bedroom, but as head-boy Rufus had the large study with a fire-place, a bathroom and a bedroom. He was already totally familiar with the generous accommodation in which he would spend his final year at the school.

After all, his first experiences with the strict discipline which rules at St. Olaf’s had been as a first-year new-boy fag to the then head-boy, Jeremy Sefton, who had mercilessly beaten Rufus’s naked arse for the flimsiest of reasons on many, many occasion in that selfsame place.  But then just last year, thanks to his liaison with the then head-boy, Nigel Kingston, his closest friend and immediate predecessor,  he had been a regular frequenter of the head-boy’s quarters, usually for illicit sexual assignments. 

As he looked around the study – his study! – with which he was so very familiar, he saw the old oriental pot, bristling with canes, the legacy of countless of his predecessors, standing menacingly beside his desk. His eye lighted on the ancient, low-backed, leather-covered armchair, over whose back countless boys, himself included, had, over the years, bent, offering their naked arses to the tender loving care of the head-boy of the day’s cane. 

As he looked down at the tear-stained cushion on the seat of the chair, he promised himself that he would, in the coming year, add his own legacy to that permanent, historic record. Now that he was indisputably in charge of the discipline dispensed by the prefects, he would see to it that the tear-stained area increased considerably in what he fancifully thought of as the coming golden age of the cane which would occur under his tenure. The boot was firmly on his foot and, as head-boy, his word was more-or-less law. He had every intention of carrying out his duties to the letter. 

No misdeed, however minor, which came to his attention, would go unpunished. The school rules would be obeyed to the letter;  by his schoolmates, of course. There would be a regular stream of young miscreants presenting their naked arses to him for correction over the back of that armchair and he already found himself stirring in his trousers at the thought of just how hard he would thrash those buttocks, deserving or not!

Rufus was already aware that he had a stellar reputation – if it can be called that – gained during the previous year as a junior prefect and that he was probably hated by every boy in the school.  But that did not matter to him at all. As a junior prefect and now as head-boy, he had been given a job to do: a job which he secretly liked as it gave him power over his classmates: but a job which set him apart from the other boys of his age with whom he still sat in class each day. 

But even as a junior prefect, he had taken on board the Headmaster’s advice and distanced himself from his classmates. He knew that he was no longer one of them; that he could not both run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. And so, ensconced in the head-boy’s study – his study! – flush with the power which he now had,  Rufus looked forward to a year when, as head-boy, he would, quite literally, leave his mark on a large number of his schoolmates in the form of that public school speciality: a well beaten arse.

Of course, as head-boy, he had a fag.  The general practice of allocating a fag to all upper sixth formers had been stopped by the previous Headmaster, other than for the head-boy himself and the house-captains. So Rufus Rothery had what might best be called a whipping boy at his disposition for the whole of his final year at St. Olaf’s. As he sat there thinking about the power he possessed, his mind went back to his first year at the school when he had had the misfortune to be the fag of the then head-boy,  Jeremy Sefton, who had  thrashed his backside times without number.

In retrospect, it had been Jeremy Sefton and his fondness for the cane that had probably awaked that latent streak of sadism in Rufus’s character. Of course, Jeremy Sefton had not been the only prefect in the course of Rufus’s career through the school to roast his backside. But looking back on things, it was Jeremy Sefton and his painful expertise with the cane who stuck in Rufus’s memory.

Without even knowing the identity of the first former who had had the misfortune to be assigned to Rufus, as his fag, one can already feel sorry for the young lad, who would quickly find out that he had a strict martinet as his fag-master. In fact, throughout the course of his final year, Rufus more or less treated his poor fag as a backstop: someone for whom he could easily find – or possibly invent – an excuse to beat if no other deserving backside was in view.

But Rufus Rothery had greater aspirations, given his power as head-boy. Already unpopular and considered by those who had known him as junior prefect as an absolute sod, he had every intention of burnishing that doubtful reputation until, at the end of his school career, it shone like gold. It is doubtful if those who considered Rufus a sod in the general vulgar sense of th word, realised what an apposite description of Rufus’s proclivities the word implied. Given Rufus’s sexual proclivities and his general sadistic tendencies towards his fellow schoolmates, the word, sod – short for sodomite – most aptly summed his character. 

Rufus had the knack of seizing upon even the slightest peccadillo and turning it into a beatable offence. In a word he was an expert at making a mountain out of a molehill that inevitably led to a well-beaten arse for the poor lad concerned.  His reign of terror, for that is how it rapidly came to be viewed by his schoolmates, began the very first day of the new term at lunch time. Rufus did not allow the grass to grow under his feet when it came to discipline!

CHAPTER  10

In the refectory the boys sat at long tables grouped by their year. First-formers sat at their own series of separate tables, each of which was supervised by a prefect. Of course, one of these tables was under the eagle and eager eye of the head-boy, just waiting to pounce on seize on the slightest whisper of anything which smacked of a fault.  Rufus sat at the end of the table with boys seated on benches facing each other, down each side of the table. As this was the first day, the boys did not really know one another and Rufus did not yet know the names of any of the first-former lads he was supervising.

As lunch progressed, Rufus saw that the boy who was sitting in third place on his left was shovelling his food into his mouth, his fork held in his right hand like a shovel, whilst his knife languished, untouched, on the plate. Rufus saw this as an opportunity not to miss and set about building this slight lapse of what were then considered to be good table manners, into a monumental misdemeanour.

“You there, boy, the third on my left, what on earth do you think you are doing at table?”

The poor youth startled at the brusque question posed by a person who was obviously in charge replied: “I am just eating my lunch, sir.” sir.”

Rufus did not let even this trivial faux-pas pass as he went on and corrected the boy: “I am just eating my lunch, Rothery.  You do not address any of your school mates ever as sir, which is reserved for when you address a master.  However, perhaps you would now explain to me why you are holding your fork in your right hand and using it as a shovel to feed oversized gobbets of food into your mouth, whilst your knife lies unused on your plate. Young-man, in polite society, one holds the knife in one’s right hand and the fork in one’s left.  And the fork is used to spear the food – that is what the prongs are for – and never as a shovel as you are doing at the moment.”

“There is a saying: Manners maketh man. Well, young-man, all I can say after seeing you at table today, is that you have no table manners at all.  What is your name, boy, and in which form are you?”

By now the young lad was totally embarrassed by this onslaught from the head-boy: “My name is David Patterson, sir. Sorry, I mean Rothery.

“Are you aware, Paterson, that in polite society, one does not eat in the way you were doing just now?”

“Yes, Rothery, and I am sorry, it won’t happen again.”

By now the table had fallen silent as Rufus convicted his interrogation of the unfortunate Patterson.  “Stand up, Patterson, and let me take a good look at you.”

Patterson extricate himself from the communal bench on which he was stating and stood there totally embarrassed by what was happening to him.  

Rufus looked disdainfully at him before saying: ‘Patterson, I see that you have as much regard for your appearance as you seem to have for your eating habits. Just look at yourself, boy; the top button of your shirt is undone and the knot of your tie not in the place it should be, which is between the tabs of your shirt collar. And I see also that you evidently forgot to clean your shoes this morning as they look as though you have just come in from a field.” 

This was a blatant exaggeration as Patterson’s shoes, although not gleamingly polished as the school rules dictated, were not all that bad.  Patterson was just one of those boys, who, come what may, would always look a little dishevelled. But Patterson’s table manners and his less than perfect attire were all the ammunition Rufus needed.

“Patterson, I think you are seriously in need of guidance as to how boys are expected to behave in this school. See me in my study immediately following lunch when I shall attempt to set you right on a number of things.  Now, sit down, boy, and finish your lunch.”

Any appetite Patterson had had, had, by now, vanished and his half finished plate remained untouched. Needless to say, after this rather unnerving incident, the whole table finished the meal in total silence.  All the boys at the table were first formers and new to the school. But the ominous way in which the head-boy had spoken to Patterson and the order to see him in his study said it all.  The whole table knew that Patterson was going to get his arse whacked before he grew much older.

Rufus arrived at his study before Patterson, his first victim and installed himself magisterially behind his desk. And make no mistake, David Patterson was a victim o Rufus’s desire to whack arse, come what may. There was no way that the co-called offence he had committed merited any form of corporal punishment, or for that matter any punishment at all, other than a possible, gentle,, verbal reprimand to mend his table manners.   

A timid knock came at the door and after a slight pause, Rufus shouted, through the closed door, to the boy to come in. A very timid and nervous-looking Patterson entered the study and stood, visibly trembling, before the head-boy. With the oriental pot bristling with punishment canes to his right, and a stern look on his face, Rufus made a frightening impression on the young lad who had no idea at all what was about to happen to him.

“Patterson, I would be failing in my duty as head-boy of this school if I allowed you to continue with your appalling table manners. Your parents have sent you to this school to benefit from an education which  befits a young gentleman and your manners are anything but those which are expected of you, even as a new boy.  And then, just look at your general appearance; you, Patterson, look as though you have been dragged through a hedge. The school rules are quite clear on dress and you, for some reason, you seem to have chosen to ignore them completely.”

Rufus went on and on, until he had reduced the young lad almost to tears by his verbal onslaught.  And so it was almost a relief to the lad, when the axe finally fell and Patterson learned of his immediate fate.

“And so I am sure that you will agree with me, that I would be remiss in my duty as head-boy if I were not to attempt to correct your obvious misconception of the way boys are expected to behave in this school: to bring home to you in a very immediate way, what is considered acceptable and what is definitely not.”

“So, Patterson, it is with great reluctance that I am afraid I have no alternative but to beat you. You will appreciate that I will take no pleasure at all in what I am about to do to you, which is done only with your own best interests at heart.  But I have to say that it is amazing what an immediate beneficial effect a sharp and, I regret to say, painful dose of the cane applied to a boy’s posterior, has on his behaviour.”

By this time, Patterson had become resigned to his fate and said nothing. How he felt on his very first day at the school that he was going to have his arse whacked for what was hardly an offence at all, we shall never know. But offence or not, it was sufficient to allow Rufus to indulge in one of his favourite pastimes: beating arse.  As if to confirm Patterson’s fate, Rufus rummaged around among the canes in the pot at his side, finally selected one and held it up for Patterson to see.

Then, as if to show the lad that it was fit for purpose, he bent the implement of punishment more or less into a full circle before allowing it to spring back and  swishing it dramatically down through the air a few times,. Not surprisingly, Patterson flinched when he saw what the head-boy had in store for him.  But the full impact of what a beating by the head-boy at St. Olaf’s really implied for the unfortunate recipient, was yet to be brought home to the young lad, who not surprisingly after the dramatic demonstration he had just witnessed, was now trembling with fear of what was to come,

“Take off you blazer, Patterson, lay it on the table over there and then go and stand behind the armchair over there.”

Patterson did as ordered and stood there waiting the next instruction.

“Now, Patterson, drop your trousers and underpants and bend across the back of the chair and place your hands firmly on the arms of the chair. And make sure that you get that key part of your anatomy, your backside, high into the air, boy, as the dog has got to see the rabbit.”

This was the horrible moment of truth for Patterson: the moment when he finally realised what Rothery had in store for him. He had resign himself to being whacked, but had not reckoned that he was going to take the cane across his bare arse.

He started to protest: “Oh please, Rothery, you are not going to whack me on my bare bum, are you?  Please Rothery, not on my bare bum. Couldn’t I at least keep my underpants on?  I have never ever been whacked before and I am terrified of what you are about to do to me. So, please, please, please, Rothery, not on the bare, I beg of you. It will just hurt too much.”

“Patterson, when I give a boy and order, I do not expect to be questioned on it; I expect it to be obeyed and obeyed immediately. So kindly do as I have just said, lower your trousers and underpants and present to me you bare bum – as you call it – for punishment.  Patterson, as you are obviously unaware of the way things are done in this school when a boy is caned, it is always – I  repeat, always –  across his bare buttocks, And that, young-man, goes for all of us, from first formers to sixth.”

“Incidentally, for your information, here at St. Olaf’s, we, the boys throughout the school, always refer to our bottoms as our arses.  Vulgar, I grant you; but that is the way it is. So after your beating, you will be sporting what is usually referred to as a well-beaten arse. And just so that you are not disappointed, allow me to say, that I am an expert at providing boys with well-beaten arses. “

“Also, although I am head-boy and in which capacity I am authorised by the the Headmaster to cane miscreants such as you, I too am subject to the exact same rules. If I break a rule, then even my status as head-boy will not save me from punishment. Believe me, Patterson; the Headmaster would have no hesitation in beating me on the bare if I merited it just as I have none at the moment in beating you. So now that we have got that straight, get your bare arse across the back of that armchair and let’s get on with things.”

Patterson, looking ever more nervous and clearly on the verge of tears, finally complied and presented what was a plump and undefiled  virgin  arse – virgin, every sense of the word – to Rufus.

“Patterson, before I begin, I think you should be aware of what is considered acceptable behaviour for a boy whilst he is being beaten. As ever there is a certain traditional protocol that young gentlemen such as you, who are being punished, are expected to observe.  I am telling you this before I administer the first of the six cuts of the cane, so that you do not stray from what is acceptable behaviour as you are being punished.”

Now at least, Patterson knew, for the first time, exactly how many strokes he would have to bear.

“Firstly, Patterson, you must keep perfectly still with your hands firmly on the arms of the chair. Under no circumstances may you allow your hands to stray to your buttocks in an attempt to diminish the pain that you will be experiencing. And make no mistake, Patterson; have no false illusions; your buttocks will be very painful after I have finished with you. Pain, Patterson, is the name of the game when it comes to correcting an errant youth such as you. Moreover, you must keep still and under no circumstances attempt to stand up during the course of your beating.”

“So let us be quite clear, Patterson, as to what will happen if you do not follow the simple rules I have just outlined. There are no ifs and buts; quite simply, the punishment will be started again from the beginning. So, young-man, if you value your arse, I suggest you obey the rules and take your punishment in the way a young gentleman should. Break the rules and your backside will suffer even more.”

“Patterson, the cane, and its regular application to the bare arses of boys who misbehave, is a permanent feature of life in this school. So just accept the fact that if you are caught breaking any of the school’s rules you are putting your arse on the line; it will be beaten; and make no mistake; it will be beaten hard.”

“Oh, just one final point before we move on to the practical side of our meeting today. You may make as much noise as you wish. Beatings are painful events and there is no shame in crying out with the pain you will shortly be enduring or in shedding a few tears. No one will think the less of you for expressing your feelings. My own view is that if a boy stands up in tears from a beating I have just given him, I have done a good job. Well I think that is all, Patterson. So shall we initiate your arse into one of the key activities of the school?”

Patterson had had to endure this long-winded homily from the head-boy whilst in the uncomfortable position of being stretched, arse naked, across the armchair. By this time, the poor lad’s buttocks were quivering with the thought of what the head-boy intended to visit on him and it was all he could do to not to piss himself. Resigned as he had, by now, become, to having his bare arse shredded with the cane, he just wished that Rufus would stop talking and get on with the job to hand. He quite rightly considered that the beating he was about to be given was totally unjustified – which it was – but he realised that he had absolutely no means of avoiding it.

And so, as Rufus Rothery finished his remarks, David Patterson, closed his eyes, gritted his teeth and prayed he would not disgrace himself as he waited for the first stroke of the cane to mate with his bare arse. The lad was justifiably nervous, as he had never before felt a cane across his bottom.  But the seemingly interminable wait was still not over. Suddenly the head-boy, who had been tapping the cane across Patterson’s bare arse, positioning his first stroke, stopped what he was doing.

CHAPTER 11

For a moment silence reigned as Rufus moved silently towards the closed door of his study, across which he thought he had discerned a slight sound. Arriving at the door, he silently turned the knob before suddenly flinging the door open. Two first formers, who had evidently had their ears close to the door eavesdropping, fell, more or less, into the room.

He then noticed another first-former standing sheepishly against the opposite wall of the corridor  and as he glance down the corridor, saw the back-end of a fourth boy, running away from what was to become the scene the crime!

“Well, well, well, what have we here? You two, who have more or less fallen into my study whilst you were eavesdropping, what are your names and what is the name of your third classmate who is standing at the other side of the corridor. Curiosity, it is said, killed the cat. Well your joint curiosity to find out what was happening to your classmate, Patterson, if not exactly killing you, is going to have some very, very painful consequences, which you may well find worse than death.” 

“But I see I said the three of you, when I should probably have said four. As I opened the door, I saw a fourth boy legging it off down the corridor, presumably to avoid being caught with the three of you.  There were four of you in your little eavesdropping venture, weren’t there? Well the three of you had better come in. You will then satisfy your curiosity to the full and indeed, will have the opportunity to participate fully in the the little drama which is currently being enacted around Patterson’s arse.”

“Boys, you are all new to the school, but I recognised all of you as sitting at the table with Patterson this lunch time. So first give me your names.”

Having ascertained that he was talking to John Gregson, John Cromarty and Colin Hansen, Rufus went on to find out the identity of the fourth boy, who had run away, abandoning his classmates to their fate.

“What is the name of the fourth boy, the one who ran off down the corridor as I opened the door? Come on boys; I want to know his name as he is guilty of eavesdropping as the three of you.  So come clean boys and give me his name.”

As might have been expected, the three lads looked sheepish and gave no answer. So Rufus, not to be deflected from his purpose said: “Well then, one of you had better go and find your friend and tell him to present himself to the head-boy in his study within the next five minutes. You do not need to tell me his name; just transmit the message to him and tell him to present himself here as ordered. Tell him that it is an order and not a request and that it will be worse for him if he does not re-join your ill-conceived espionage group.”

“So which of you three is going to be the messenger? Gregson you will do. Go to it young-man; and then come straight back here and let the fourth, absconded member of your ill fated venture come back here by himself.  That way you cannot be accused of ratting on him. Make it clear to him that if he does not come here of his own free will, I shall find him anyway and he will suffer a worse fate than that which you three lads have pre-ordained for yourselves by your lamentable eavesdropping.”

Gregson went off on his errand to find the absentee member of the ill- fated group. Once in Rufus’s study, the other two lads suddenly realised that they were looking at a site which few are privileged to behold: the bare arse of their classmate, Patterson, still stretched over the back of the armchair waiting for the first stroke of the six he had been promised.

“Well, the two of you, you see the position you are required to adopt when you are to be punished. Your classmate, Patterson, is showing you exactly what is required of you when you are to have your arse beaten.  And so, boys, as that is exactly what is shortly going to happen to all three of you, I suggest that you two prepare yourselves. Take of your blazers and shoes and then take off your trousers and underpants and stand in a line with your hands on your heads, whilst I continue with Patterson’s punishment, which you scamps have so rudely interrupted.”

The two young lads looked bewildered at what they had just been ordered to do.

“Cromarty said: “You don’t mean that want is to stand there naked with our heads on our heads whilst you beat Patterson, do you Rothery?”

“That, Cromarty, is exactly what I mean; you have understood me to perfection; so I suggest that the pair of you jump to it. Come on; blazers and shoes off and step out of your underpants,  get your hands on your head and let me see your bare arses, whilst I attend to Patterson’s needs, which thanks to the delay you have caused are becoming pressing.”

Relucantly, Cromarty and Hansen started stripping off their lower clothes.  Rufus picked up the cane again and turned his attention to the long-suffering Patterson, still uncomfortably stretched across the armchair with his bare arse in the air waiting for that first stroke of the cane.

“Patterson, I really do apologise for the delay, caused entirely by the untimely and unwarranted activities of your classmates. I will now attempt to put matters right and we will take up where we left off before we were so rudely interrupted.  However, by way of compensation for you, I will allow you to remain and witness your classmates being punished. In that way you will see that you are in no way being victimised for your own errors and that I am even handed in dealing with all boys who break the rules.”

Rufus laid the cane for the second time across the long-suffering Patterson’s naked arse and was about to award him his first stroke when Gregson knocked at the study door and entered. The lad’s eyes almost popped out of his head when he saw a recumbent, naked Patterson, his arse stretched across the back of the chair, about to be beaten and his two partners-in-crime, standing there with their hand s on their heads and in a position, which is vulgarly – but succinctly – referred to as bullock-naked!

“Welcome back, Gregson; I hope you had a fruitful journey.”

“Yes thank you, Rothery.  Darke is on his way here now, Rothery.”

“That is certainly good news, Gregson.  I am sure we all would have hated for fourth member of of your misguided group of merry men, to miss out on the – how shall I put it – the fruits of your enterprise? Well Gregson time is, as ever, of the essence, so I suggest you divest yourself of the necessary clothing and go and align yourself with your two friends over there. Go on boy, get your pants off and go and stand with your hands on your head with Cromarty and Hansen over there.   I will attend to the burning need of all three of you as soon as I have finished dealing with Patterson.”

Turning again with his cane towards Patterson and his expectant naked arse, Rufus was again interrupted by another knock on the door, this time announcing the arrival of one, Geoffrey Darke, the fourth of the ill fated group of young miscreants.

“Ah, Mr. Darke, no doubt; how nice of you to join us young-man.  I am not sure what your three friends over there think of your running off and leaving them to carry the can for you. But better late than never, I suppose. So Darke, as you can see from your three friends, what the drill is, I suggest you make yourself ready in the same way as they already have done and go and join them.”

“Oh, Rothery, I am sorry I ran off like that, but was just so scared of what would happen to us if we were caught.  And could I just tell you that my name has an E at the end?”

“Darke, if I were you, I would worry less about the spelling of my name and more about what is about to happen to my backside.  In running off, you deserted your friends and left them in the lurch, which is a very un-gentlemanly and cowardly thing to have done. But in so doing, you compounded your problems. You, young-man, broke one of the most strictly enforced rules of the school when you ran off down the corridor.”

“Running, anywhere inside the school buildings, is strictly forbidden and if caught, as you have been, is automatically punished by six strokes of the cane delivered on the bare. And so, Darke, just reflect on that fact whilst you await your beating. Make no mistake, Darke, I am going to beat all four of you. However, not only will you receive six strokes for your eavesdropping along with your classmates, but you will take an additional six for running in the corridor.  And believe me, Darke, when I tell you that I do know how to deliver when I beat a boy”

And with that, leaving Darke to contemplate his immediate future fate, Rufus was finally able to address Patterson’s long-waiting arse with his cane. Patterson’s bare buttocks trembled with fear as Rufus again laid the cane across them and prepared his first stroke. As the cane descend for the first time and landed with the crack of a pistol  shot on poor Patterson’s posterior, the lad was silent for a moment but then as he felt the full horror of the searing pain which a well-seasoned and well-applied rattan cane always delivers, he let out his first howl of anguish.

All of the four observers were simultaneously fascinated and horrified to see Patterson suffering,  especially so as they all realized that within the next few minutes it was their own arses which would be on the line  and they would be receiving the same.  It was all just too awful to contemplate.

As the beating progressed, Patterson’s appreciation of what was happening to him became ever more evident, judging by the increased volume of his cries of pain. By the time the third stroke landed on Patterson’s naked arse, the lad could not hold back his tears, which were the first of many to add themselves to that stain on the cushion that he had been forced, due to the numerous interruptions, to gaze upon for so long. The lad pleaded with Rufus to stop. But it was to no avail and when he finally was told to get up from the chair he was weeping profusely.

Ruthless Rufus, true to his nickname, then made Patterson stand with his head on his hands alongside the other four lads who were awaiting their punishment.  He even forbade the lad to massage his buns in the normal, post-beating, usually futile attempt to lessen the pain. Poor Patterson, who really been grossly over-punished for a minor lapse in minor laps in manners at the lunch table, was even forbidden to try to palliate the pain he was enduring. Such was the unforgiving nature of the head-boy.

With some considerable trepidation, Cromarty, Gregson and Hansen were made successively to present their nakedness to Rufus for correction. Rufus spared the three lads not one bit as he brought the cane crashing down six times on each of the three naked arses in turn. Again, no quarter was given, and at the the end of the session, four tearful lads stood, hand on their heads, displaying their richly striped and very painful bottoms to Darke, who was, by this time, almost pissing himself with the fear of what was now to come.

It has to be said that the eavesdropping contingent warranted much less sympathy than poor Patterson, the inadvertent originator of this afternoon’s blood-bath. It was quite reasonable for Rufus to beat the three of them for eavesdropping, a very ungentlemanly act for which they truly merited the stripes which they were now sporting. But when it came to Darke, well the offences moved to a totally different level which truly justified a very severe beating for the lad.

“Darke, kindly step forward, boy and approach the armchair.  Darke, I do not know if you realize the contempt that I, and I imagine also your three partners in crime over there, view your actions this afternoon. You, boy, were associated with what was, by any standards, a despicable act. But then when you thought that you might ne caught, you fled the scene leaving your three classmates to carry the can for you.  But then, in your haste to disappear, broke a key rule of the school in running off down the corridor, in the hope of escaping escaping detection.”

“Well, young-man, you have seen what happened to your three classmates for their part in this sad affair. Well just let me tell you what you deserve and are now to receive is much worse.  You will take six strokes for eavesdropping and a further six for running in the corridor. And moreover, to bring home to you how deplorable I view your behaviour, I shall cane you six-on-six  to ensure that you really do learn your lesson.”

“That is to say I shall give you six parallel strokes and then apply the next six directly in the stripes left by the first six. When I have finished with you, in a few minutes time, you, Darke, will be unable able to sit down comfortably for three or four days. Believe me, Darke, you will regret ever having become involved in this disgraceful business.”

By this time, Darke, for whom, in view his actions, one can have but little sympathy, if any at all,  had gone quite pale and was already beginning to cry. But then, under the same circumstances, who would not have felt afraid, His immediate future had just been spelled for him in the greatest of horrific detail and he was justifiably trembling as he bent across the chair and offered his naked arse to Rufus for correction.

Rufus, as ever applied the cane as hard as he could. And as stroke followed parallel stroke, with four being applied low down towards the crease to ensure that the lad felt the most pain possible, Darke wept profusely and cried out loudly with pain at each stroke. 

Then, when the first six strokes had been applied, Rufus paused for a minute, allowing the lad to appreciate what he had just received, before going on and applying the next six cuts, neatly doubling the existing stripes on Darke’s buns. As stroke followed painful stroke, he howled ever more loudly.

His three classmates, who were seeing their head-boy in action, were, of course, in a way delighted to see that their erstwhile partner was receiving his comeuppance. But as the second six strokes followed in the tracks of the first, they winced at the savage way Rufus used his cane.

Darke finally arose tearful from over the back of the chair, and as indicated by Rufus, hobbled across to his four classmates, all of who were still standing there half naked with their hands on their heads.

“Well boys let that be a lesson to you all. In this school as you now see, any and every misdemeanour, however small will be corrected with the cane. And believe me it is my job to make sure that you all toe the line. So make no mistake. If any of you step out of line, then I shall have no hesitation in beating any – and, if needs be, indeed all of you – again. Now you may all get dressed and go to the first of your afternoon classes which starts in about twenty minutes.”

Rufus was jubilant in himself that he had managed to beat no less than five boys over the lunch hour of the first day of his term as head-boy. If that did not show devotion to duty, then what on earth did? It was an excellent star to his career in his capacity as head-boy. 

But he too had now twenty minutes before his first class of the afternoon for although he was head-boy and in power, almost the equal of a master, he was still a pupil in the sixth form with exams to pass before going on to university at the end of the school year.

He suddenly realised that he had become so sexually arouse by what he had just done that is cock needed immediate attention. He could already feel a quite copious emission of pre-cum wetting his underpants as he locked the door of his study and went into his private bathroom.

He extracted his rock-hard cock out of his underpants and looked with amazement at the veins pulsing with blood along its upper surface. Five beatings, one after the other, had been a very erotically arousing experience, even for him and his cock was crying out for attention.

He dropped his trousers and underpants to the floor, thereby freeing his pulsating member from their encumbrance.   And then, standing in front of the bathroom mirror, he acceded to the pressing needs of his cock and watched himself jerking off. In view of his tremendous state of arousal, orgasm came quickly, bringing with it that brief moment of exquisite delight as his body ejaculated great spurts of his rich, creamy cum, most of which finished up in great gobbets, dripping from the surface of the mirror.

Now somewhat sexually relieved, he quickly cleaned up the bathroom, wiped himself off. He was relieved to see that his sizeable endowment of uncontrollable flesh had decided to behave itself and was calming down to its docile, normal self: a size capable of being contained in his underpants, whilst at the same time showing a very attractive and desirable bulge in his crotch.  He pulled on fresh underpants as the previous pair were saturated with his own pre-cum brought on by the beatings, dressed himself himself correctly before, cool,  calm and collected, leaving his study to go to class.

But as he walked along the corridor to the sixth form room, he knew that he had to find a sex partner to replace Nigel Kingston, the previous head-boy with whom he had had an intense anal affair the previous year. But Nigel, a year older than him, had gone off to Oxford and had to be replaced. Rufus knew that he could not love without regular sex. And on that note he entered the classroom where, that afternoon, he would dazzle classmates and teacher alike, as he construed, at sight, passages from the original Greek of the Odyssey.

CHAPTER 12

Throughout his entire career, things always seemed to have an extraordinary way of arranging themselves for the best for Rufus.  His most pressing need at present was to find a sex partner among his classmates: someone who could replace the now departed Nigel Kingston, with whom he had, last year as a junior prefect, developed an enjoyed an incredibly active sex life. It was also Nigel who had been as devoted to the cane as Rufus now was, who had encouraged the lad who had become his lover, not to stint on it use on their schoolmates.

But blessed as he always seemed to be, by good luck, Rufus quickly found from among his classmates, a new partner, who replaced Nigel in the all important field of matters sexual.  And, as ever, it all happened by chance as has that chance meeting in the library last year with Nigel which had blossomed into an intimate sexual relationship between the two young men.

It was late in the afternoon on the first Saturday of the new term, that Rufus happened to be passing by the shower-room attached to the school’s gym. He heard water running and as it was late in the day, he quietly entered the shower-room, to find Oliver Crawford, one of his classmates in the sixth form, jerking himself off under the running hot-water of the shower. Engrossed as he was in attending to the needs of his cock, which what was obviously a very pleasant interlude for him, Oliver was totally unaware that he was bring observed until Rufus suddenly barked at him and asked him what he was playing at, masturbating as he was, in what was a public room.

Rufus and Oliver were not by any means close friends, but rather classmates. However, Rufus had always admired Oliver, for his beautifully proportioned, muscular physique and – well let’s not be mealy mouthed about it – the size of his sexual endowment. In public schools in England, nothing is hidden for long, least of all the physical aspects of a boy’s body.

Although Rufus had seen Oliver in the showers on a more or less daily basis for many years, he had never, until now, seen the young stud – and Oliver was really worthy of the epithet, stud – with his enviable cock in all its powerful glory; and not only erect, but like cannon in the field, loaded and primed and ready to fire.  And that is exactly what happened at the moment Rufus spoke. Oliver reached his climax and could not stop himself ejaculating his huge load of cum all over the shower cubicle.

Rufus could hardly contain himself. Looking at this magnificent and sexy young-man, naked as he was, he wanted nothing more than to strip of himself and sink his own meat, which he felt rising at the sight of Oliver jerking himself off, deep into Oliver’s anus.  At that very instant, Rufus’s only thought was of how much he wanted to fuck the young man standing before him. But protocol did not allow such a direct approach to occur. Here was a senior boy, jerking himself off publicly, in the most lewd manner, for which he not only deserved, but had to be, punished for this lamentable lapse in his behaviour. 

Rufus was head-boy and he knew, as did Oliver, that come what may, Oliver would have to be corrected for his lack of common sense. Oliver had publicly committed an act so gross that as head-boy, Rufus could not simply ignore it. It had to be dealt with; dealt with immediately; dealt with thoroughly. Oliver had to suffer the painful consequences of his actions. And as we already know, Rufus really did know how to deliver pain.

But at the same time as he steeled himself to take to take a stern, official stance with Oliver, Rufus was already turning over in his mind where a private meeting between the two of them might lead.  Oliver already knew, although he would try – and fail – to talk his way out of it, that his arse was toast.

“Crawford, I don’t know what you were thinking of wanking in the showers. Clean off the mess you have just made with your emission from the wall tiles where you have managed to project it. Then yourself off, get dressed and get out of here. I think you had better come to see me in my study, after supper this evening. And so that you make no mistake in what is going to happen to you, I suggest you present yourself wearing just your gym strip with no underpants beneath your shorts. That will facilitate matters when we meet.”

“What the fuck do you think you are doing, Rothery, pulling rank on me for doing something we all do – you included. The whole lot of us wank, as well you know. So if you think that you are going to see me in your study tonight and roast my arse with your bloody cane, you can think again.  I am just not going to kow-tow to you Rothery, just because you are head-boy. You are a total hypocrite, as you are as big a wanker yourself as any of us.”

“Crawford, the question is not whether you or I, or for that matter, any or all of us in the sixth-form wank. It goes without saying we all do it, me included. I am not pulling rank on you, as you choose to call it, but I have pulled you up because you cannot be allowed to go on doing, in a public place, what I caught you doing just now. Crawford, I have not asked you to come to my study this evening to punish you for wanking, but for being foolish enough to commit, in public, what is, by any standards of decency, a lewd and offensive act.  And for that you do deserve to be punished.”

“So to cut to the chase, you have what the mathematically minded would call a binary choice. You can do as I have suggested and come to see me at eight in my study, when I shall have the unfortunate task of giving you six cuts with a senior cane on the bare.  And please do not question my authority in the matter. I am the head-boy of this school and I have the authorization and indeed, the blessing, of the   Headmaster to beat any boy whom I catch misbehaving, from the first form right through and including the upper sixth.”

“In view of the grossness of the act you have just committed, I think that even you must agree that you qualify admirably to be beaten. You have, after all committed a serious offence and you are in the upper sixth.  Not to mince words, your visit to my study will be painful for you. But compared with the alternative; taking six with the senior cane across your bare arse from me will seem like a gentle kiss. And there may be compensation later.”

“As I say, you are faced with a binary choice. If you decide not to accept my invitation for this evening to purge your sins in the privacy of my study, then I shall have no alternative but to report your behaviour to our revered Headmaster, with all that implies.  And you should have no illusions on what will happen if you decide to plead your case in front of the Headmaster.  As a minimum you will be given twelve cuts of the birch in front of the entire sixth form and you may well find yourself being expelled from the school.”

“Don’t think I am joking, Crawford, when I say that you might be chucked out. Two years ago the Headmaster publicly birched and expelled a boy from the lower sixth for smoking and drinking. So that could happen to you too. You are, as the saying has it, between a rock and a hard place. But choose wisely for the hard place, occupied by the Headmaster may prove to be very hard indeed.”

Crawford, having listened to the head-boy and knowing full well that his actions, which he knew had been stupid, presaged a very sore arse for him, come what may, made, nevertheless, one last ditch attempt to to extricate himself from a situation which was entirely of his own own making.

And so, now in a much less aggressive tone of voice he said:  “Rothery, don’t you think that you are really are making a mountain out of a molehill. Come on, Rothery, we are classmates, so couldn’t you just turn a blind eye.  I agree I was stupid. But you know as well as I do, that sometimes the needs of one’s cock become so imperative, that one is forced to obey and that is exactly what happened just now. I just could not stop myself jerking off. Surely you see that.  So please, Rothery, just let’s drop the whole thing and forget it ever happened.”

‘Crawford, if I do as you suggest, I would be betraying the trust which the Headmaster put in me when he made me head-boy. But over and above that, I should risk losing whatever authority I have in my present position. Word would get around – as it always does – that the new head-boy is a soft touch: a guy whose bark is much worse than his bite. Now that would never do, as I am sure you can see.”

“So I am afraid, Crawford, there is no way in which you can escape doing penance for your sins.  Crawford your choice is simple, but I am afraid, inevitably, painful for you. Either you come wearing your gym strip to my study at eight this evening and take six on the bare from me. Or you go to see the Headmaster, in which case you will most certainly be birched in front of your classmates and, additionally, face the possibility of expulsion.  The decision, Crawford, is yours, and yours alone to make.”

And with that, Rufus left Crawford to stew in his own juice. Of course, Rufus, with his penchant for beating arse, had had no intention at all of referring Crawford to the Headmaster. Why on earth should he hand over a sixth-former to the Headmaster when he could give himself the pleasure of roasting the arse of a bird that was a rare catch?  

Beating a classmate of his own age was a really erotic act, not to be compared with the banal canings visited on the naked arses of younger boys., who, to coin a phrase, were more or less available ten a penny. But the opportunity to beat the muscular arse of a sixth- former was a chance not to be sneezed at.

CHAPTER 13

That evening, after supper, Rufus sat waiting behind his desk in his study. In preparation for what he fully expected to be Crawford’s arrival, he had already selected the senior cane which he intended to use on Crawford’s arse and pulled the armchair, in readiness, into the middle of the room.  And so he sat at his desk and waited until the appointed hour for Crawford to arrive.  He was practically certain  that Crawford would opt for a beating from him rather than being referred to the Headmaster, as the ramifications of a meeting with him were just to awful to contemplate.  But whatever Crawford decided, one thing was certain; he was heading inexorably towards that well-beaten arse, that universal hallmark of English public school punishments.

As he had foreseen, Crawford had decided on what was clearly the less painful option open to him and entered Rufus’s study dead on eight. He was wearing only in the gym strip as requested and stood awkwardly in front of the head-boy.  He made one last ditch attempt to save what he knew full-well to be his doomed arse from the rigours of the three-foot-long, senior rattan-cane lying in full view in front of him on Rufus’s desk.

“Look here, Rothery, you’re not really intending to go through with this are you?  Come on, Rothery; be reasonable, it’s not normal for a prefect to beat one of his direct classmates. So why don’t we just call the whole thing off, shake hands and part as friends. After all, I have apologised for my behaviour, which I admit, was a bit over the top. But come on, Rothery; I really am very sorry for what I did and it will never ever happen again. So what do you say, Rothery? Can’t we just forget the the whole incident ever took place?”

Crawford must have known that he was wasting his breath, but he felt he had to have one last try to save his arse from what he knew was a lost cause.

“Crawford, as I have already explained to you, I am duty bound in the position of trust I occupy as head-boy, that I cannot allow your stupid action to pass unpunished. It I let you off the hook, then that would mean throwing away my authority.  So, Crawford, I am sorry, but we cannot just forget the incident and shake hands. But before we get down to the business at hand, just let me say that there is nothing at all personal in what I am about to do to you and there is no reason whatsoever why, after you have taken your beating, we should not shake hands and part as friends.”

“And just let me add, that I am already being very lenient in giving   you only six with the cane. Your offence your offence merits at least twelve cuts and although you may be unaware of the fact, as head-boy, I am authorised to give up to eighteen cuts for any one offence. So be thankful for my leniency.  Now, I think, Crawford, as this is surely not the first time you have had your arse whacked in this school, that enough has been said. So if you would kindly adopt the time honoured position over the back of the armchair over there, with which you are certainly conversant, I will do my very best to correct you and instil into you the difference between what is and what is not acceptable behaviour for a sixth former at St.Olaf’s.”

Whilst the two of them had been engaged in what amounted to a final battle of words, which Rufus, by virtue of his position was inevitably destined to win, Rufus had felt his cock hardening in his pants at the thought of what he was about to visit on Crawford’s arse.  Rufus was absolutely delighted that he had caught a sixth former doing something for which he could genuinely justify a beating.  For Rufus, there was something very satisfying in being able to exercise his power over a boy of his own age and, moreover, one with whom he sat together in the very same class. 

Even although he was authorised to beat any boy in the entire school if necessary, it was not easy to take that first step and exercise his authority over a boy of his own age – witness Crawford’s initial, explosive reaction. But thanks to Crawford’s stupidity, he had provided Rufus with a benchmark in his career as head-boy, a career which was not yet one week old.

Everyone would know that the head-boy had beaten Crawford, his direct classmate, no less, and had, therefore, to be taken seriously by everyone.  If he could beat Crawford, then he could beat anyone and everyone. So thanks to Crawford’s action, Rufus’s authority and standing as a strict-non-nonsense-disciplinarian was established by the end of that first week.

As Rufus stood up and picked up the cane from his desk, he could feel his cock, now fully aroused and moist, thrusting hard against the crotch of his trousers. He was aware as he stood there, flexing the cane, that Crawford’s eyes were fixed on his bulging crotch. But equally he saw that Crawford’s thin gym shots were also tented towards him by what he already knew was Crawford’s generous endowment. So what I suppose we might call the verbal- foreplay to Crawford’s imminent beating had sexually aroused Rufus, the putative beater, and the soon-to-be-beaten Crawford.

“Well, Rothery, as you seem to intent on taking your pound of flesh, let’s get on with it and get this fucking thing over and done with.”

Having said this, Crawford went slowly across to the armchair, his cock thrusting firmly against his gym shorts.  Then, by accident or design – probably the latter – he bent over the back of the chair without dropping his shorts. Crawford knew as well as any other boy at the school that all beatings were given on the bare and so he knew full well that his shorts would, one way or another, come down before the cane mated with his arse.

Rufus – correctly as it turned out – seeing this as an unspoken invitation to explore Crawford’s nether region more closely, went across to him, touched his arse lightly with the cane and said: “I think Crawford,  that we can dispense with the shorts, don’t you.  I always think that they detract from the the effect of what is about to take place. Stay as you are and let me help you to get rid of them before we start.”

And then Rufus made Crawford ease himself up slightly from over the chair and helped him to extricate his shorts from his burgeoning cock on which they were, more or less impaled. Without any embarrassment, Rufus put his hand down the front of Crawford’s shorts, took a firm grip of his rock-hard member and with his other hand pulled the elastic waistband over the Crawford’s erection.  Released from the stick-like encumbrance of his cock, Rufus then had no difficulty in pulling down the shorts, thereby giving himself his first close-up view of Crawford’s magnificent pair of hairless, muscular mounds, which he was about to shred with his cane.

This little drama took place without a word being said by either participant. But Rufus instinctively knew that Crawford’s silence and wordless acquiescence to this first act of body contact between the two of them presaged more to come later.  After all, it is not every day that one man finds himself with his erect penis in the hands of another man. And the fact that the hand was proffered in what was a superficially helpful context, spoke volumes.

The fatidic moment had finally arrived. Rufus position himself to Crawford’s right. This in itself was an unusual position to adopt, for most school beatings are performed with the beater standing to the the left of the target arse with the being applied forehand. But Rufus, under the tutelage of the previous head-boy, Nigel Kingston, had learned of the superiority of the backhand stroke. As Nigel had convincingly explained to him, the habitual forehand approach meant that the beater raised the cane above his right shoulder and then brought it down across his own body to mate with the arse of the poor unfortunate being beaten.

In his view, which has considerable merit, this approach was much less satisfactory, than applying the strokes backhand. Here, the beater raises the cane across his chest and over his left shoulder, from which position a downward stroke can be made in one fluid movement from top left to bottom right avoiding the beater’s arm crossing his body. Add to this that if the beater’s right hand, which is holding the cane, is bent more or less at a right-angle to the arm, on contact with the target, the wrist can be flicked straight, adding an additional bite to the blow. As Rufus was an attentive pupil to Kingston, this finer point in the art of flagellation had not escaped Rufus’ attention.

So in the previous year, as a junior prefect, under the watchful eye and expert tutelage of the Nigel Kingston, Rufus Rothery had persevered to perfect the technique of beating arse backhand. And by the end of that first term, after regular and diligent practice on the naked backsides of countless of his schoolmates, under the ever watchful eye, corrective comments of, and practical demonstrations by, Nigel Kingston, he had achieved his objective. Rufus was quite capable of giving any boy’s arse hell as he placed each stroke with military precision.

And it was a practical application of Rufus’s by now, perfect technique, which the unfortunate Oliver Crawford was about to experience on his naked arse.

Now it has to be said that in the not-so-gentle-art of schoolboy, arse flagellation, the backhand technique requires considerable practice to ensure that each stroke lands in exactly the right place on the recipient’s arse. Exact placing of each stroke is the key to leaving a boy with a well-beaten arse, which should be not only a visual, welted  masterpiece of precisely placed welts,  but which is also so painful for the unfortunate owner that, at that moment, he heartily wishes his burning buttocks belonged to someone else.

It was to this was the state of technically flawless, flagellative perfection Rufus had aspired as a junior prefect. When Rufus had finished with a boy, his arse was not a muddled mess of criss-crossed welts, as is so often thecae, but an admirably ordered series of deep parallel cuts. But let us be quite clear it was precision which was not achieved at the expense of force. When Rufus Rothery had finished beating a boy, the unfortunate recipient of his painful ministrations usually thought twice before allowing himself to fall ever again into the hands of such a severe martinet.  

Not for nothing had Rufus Rothery acquired the nickname, Ruthless Rufus, by the end of his first term as a junior prefect. Among the younger boys, on whose arses, it has to be said, he concentrated his efforts, he was the most feared and hated of all the prefects. And this is the man who as head-boy, is now about to address Oliver Crawford’s naked arse with a senior cane. Little wonder that with such a stellar reputation, Crawford was dreading what was in store for him. But the moment was still not ripe for Rufus to put Crawford out of his misery as he could not resist giving Crawford  a few homilies before getting down to the job at hand.

“Crawford, the purpose in beating a boy is to correct him for an offence, which, at his school, is still done by addressing the offender’s arse with the traditional rattan cane. As you are in the sixth form, I am going to use a senior cane on you today, and as you are now about to find out, I am an expert in its use. Brace yourself, Crawford, as this is intended to be, and indeed will be, a very painful experience for you

Crawford, wanting by now to get the thing over and done with, wished that Rufus would cut the cackle and get on with it. He closed his eyes, gritted his teeth and waited for the first stroke of the promised six to land on his naked and totally vulnerable arse. When that first stroke finally came, even he, a senior boy, who in his career at the school, like so many others, Rufus included, had suffered many beatings at the hands of a variety of prefects, several different head-boys, his housemaster and, on one memorably awful occasion, by the Headmaster himself, had never ever experienced anything which remotely compared with the red-hot pain that Rufus delivered: Rufus was in a class of his own.

If Crawford had yelped loudly with the searing pain of that first stroke, by the third, Rufus had reduced him to tears. As Rufus had promised him only six cuts in all, he had placed the first cut more-or-less in the middle of Crawford’s buns. The second was a little higher towards the bottom of his back, before, with what can but be described as malice aforethought, he gave Crawford four stingers much lower down in the crease, the most sensitive area of any lad’s arse.  By the time he had finished, Crawford was weeping profusely and sporting what by any standards qualified as a superbly well beaten arse: an example of What can be achieved with the TLC of a well- pplied senior cane.

If ever a lad had harvested what he had sown, at that very moment, it was Crawford. He had merited a severe beating, but after he had experienced the severity with which Rufus had attacked his nakedness, he found himself wondering if a dreaded Headmaster’s birching, always talked of, but seldom ever experienced by any of the boys, as the nec-plus-ultra of corporal punishment, could have been any worse.

And it is true that the two implements, the birch and the rattan cane, both of which are capable of imparting agonising pain to the unfortunate recipient, are totally different. Whereas the birch gradually builds up the pain to indescribable levels, its multiple thin twigs leaving dozens of small welts across the entire surface of the victim’s arse, the cane, with its precision, immediately produces discrete stripes of instant agony and, in wrong hands, can do a lot more damage than the birch.

But Rufus’s hands were not wrong-hands. Even though he regularly delivered the most stinging of canings and never held back, he never ever broke the skin of the boy he was beating: there was never any blood when Rufus had finished addressing a boy’s arse with the rattan cane. However, the unfortunate recipient never got up from a beating but Rufus with less than a well-beaten arse which felt as if it had been branded by a red-hot poker.

And this was the case with Crawford. Even though Rufus had ulterior, post-flagellation designs on Crawford’s arse, he had still not been able to resist giving him a truly severe beating. As Crawford rose from the chair, he stepped out of his shorts which had pooled around his ankles and made the classic, essentially futile attempt, to assuage his roasted buns with a pummelling massage. Any embarrassment he might have felt on account the huge erection which he was pointing, like a loaded pistol, at Rufus, was, for the moment forgotten  in his attempts to calm the agonising pain he was experiencing.

CHAPTER 14

Rufus looked lasciviously at Crawford’s magnificent sexual endowment, which was clearly crying out for immediate attention. Couple this with the fact that Rufus’s own hard cock was practically bursting out from the fly of his trousers, it was obvious that both young men were in urgent need of some sexual relief. 

Rufus took the bull by the horns and said:  “Look here, Crawford, I know I have been a bit hard on you, but I am sure that you realise that you deserved it. But now that is all over, if you wish, you can go into my private bathroom and sit on the lavatory pan and attempt to lessen the pain by bathing your arse in cold water.  And after that, Oliver, if you bend over the chair again, I will massage a little soothing aloe vera ointment into your stripes, which will help reduce the pain.”

It did not pass unnoticed by Crawford that Rufus had now addressed him, for the first time, by his Christian name.  As he availed himself of the cold water in Rufus’s bathroom, he wondered to himself where this was now all leading. Obviously Rufus had something else in mind, but what?   A few minutes later, with the immediate pain subsiding, Oliver Crawford again bent across the dreaded armchair but this time to have his flaming arse anointed with ointment rather than thrashed.  It had not escaped him – how could it when he stood in front of Rufus? – that Rufus , to judge from the extreme tenting of his trousers, was as sexually aroused by the act of beating him as he himself had been; and for that matter, still was.

As Rufus applied the aloe vera cream to sooth the searing pain of Oliver’s arse, he reflected on his next move.  The previous year he had had a very active and satisfactory sex life with his mentor-turned-best-friend, Nigel Kingston.  Nigel was the only person with whom Rufus had, until today, had sex. But although he had had only one partner to date,  that partner had proved to be an expert in sexual instruction and Rufus felt very comfortable with his own sexual capabilities when it came, as he hoped it would today, to fucking another man.

We are now at the end of the first week of term when Rufus has just become head-boy.  He has not had anal sex with anyone since the end of the previous summer term when he and his former partner, Nigel Kingston, both left St. Olaf’s. So as he stands there, applying the ointment to Oliver’s arse, Rufus reflects on the fact that he has not had sex for about nine weeks.  And for a young-man, who had become accustomed to anal sex two or three times a week, it is not surprising that he is suffering from severe withdrawal symptoms. Sexual intercourse is just so very addictive!

It is equally understandable, presented with Oliver’s muscularly attractive buns, albeit striped by the cane, that Rufus can hardly contain the urge he feels to fuck the young-man in front of him. There is no doubt that both of them, to judge from the rampant state of their cocks, are ready for some sort of sexual relief as both of them are both sexually aroused and tense by what has just taken place. But, as ever, one of them has to make the first move, otherwise the moment will be lost and the two of them would part.

Oliver will go off and jerk himself off in his own leaving Rufus to do the same by behind his own locked door.  It was the classic situation which has existed since the beginning of time in the English public school system. Both the beater, be it master or prefect, and the boy being beaten, if he has reached puberty, need to release their sexual tension by jerking off, immediately after the event. If ever there was a situation where three maxims dictate the actions now needed, these are they:

He who hesitates is lost – Strike whilst the iron is hot – Speed is of the essence.

Taken together and acted upon, these well known aphorisms seem to indicate the actions needed to avoid Oliver and Rufus going their separate ways and avoid forming a potentially agreeable sexual friendship.

Rufus thought back to what Nigel Kingston had said to him in a similar situation when he was the seduced, rather than as now, the seducer. As it had been the prelude to Rufus’s first time, he remembered exactly how Nigel had gone about seducing him into his bed after they had jointly just beaten two first formers. Nigel had said “Don’t you feel the need to get physical with yourself to relieve the erotic tension which has built up?

So for starters Rufus said to Oliver, again using his Christian name: “Oliver, don’t you feel the need to get physical with yourself to relieve the erotic tension which has built up? Look here, Oliver, we’re both of the age where we need some form of sexual relief. I caught you jerking off in public, but I fully understand why you felt the need to have a wank at that very moment. It’s just a pity that you chose to do it in a public place and an even greater pity that I caught you at it, which has led to the present situation and a very sore arse for you. But just look at yourself, right now. You’re all psyched up with the beating and your cock is demanding immediate attention, as is also mine. So instead of our each going off alone and jerking off in private, for that is that is what we are both going to do, I wondered if you might fancy – how shall I put it – a little joint effort at sexual fulfilment?”

“I’m not sure, Rothery, that I quite understand what you are getting at. Are you proposing that we have a joint wanking sessions or something else?”

“Look, Oliver, – and why don’t you call me Rufus now that the unpleasantness is over and done with – I sort of thought – actually hoped would be a better word – that we might develop a really close relationship as a result of this unfortunate incident which has thrown us together. Look Oliver, there is nothing personal at all in what I have just done to you. I was just fulfilling my duties as head-boy and I could not, in all conscience, let your actions go unpunished.  And if you thought I laid on the cane too hard, all I can say is that it’s the same for everyone.”

“I am a hard caner and I know I have a horrible reputation as being a right bastard, which I well might be. But you have to understand that as a prefect, one cannot run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. Even though we, the prefects, sit with the others in class, we are no longer quite the same.”

“Oliver, and I kid you not, you are a very attractive, sexy guy. And from what I have seen of you so far (Rufus fixed his gaze on Oliver’s huge erection as he spoke) I really would like to see the rest of you. So I guess that what I am asking you, is if you would like to consider getting into a sexual relationship with me.  Look, Oliver, cards on the table. I’m what is known, in polite terms, as a man’s man. I have known this since I was fourteen but I have been active sexually only since I became eighteen last year.  To call a spade a spade, I would really like to get physical with you right now. So I guess the question is: are you interested or not in developing a physical relationship with me?

“Rufus, – Oliver called head-boy by his Christian name for the first time, which Rufus took as an encouraging sign – if I understand you correctly, what you are suggestion is the you and I get physical with each other. But look, Rufus, the thing is, how physical is physical? Hitherto, I have never done anything much beyond jerking myself off in private. OK. I admit, I have occasionally wanked alongside another guy, but that is as far as I have gone.  Now, as you have levelled with me, I’ll do the same for you. Rufus, you do have a terrible reputation, and you are generally considered the worst of any of the prefects: an absolute bastard, in fact.”

“But that having been said, you are also a very attractive looking guy and I have to admit that right now, in spite of what you have just done to me – Oliver pulled a face as he said that – I admit that I am attracted towards you. In fact, Rufus, I may well be like you: a man who is drawn more towards other men than towards members of the opposite sex; not that we have much chance in a place like this, of meeting, let alone engaging with, members of the of the opposite sex. So what do you have in mind when you say that we might get physical with each other?  Rufus, you have to understand, that although you caught me wanking in public, that more or less sums up my total knowledge about sex: that is strictly as far as it goes at present.”

Rufus, listening to this confession of sexual ignorance from Oliver, said:  “Oliver, why don’t I just lock the door of my study so that we shall not be disturbed and take our potential relationship from there?”

Having received no objection from Oliver as to what he proposed, Rufus  turned the key in the lock of the of the door and then turned back to Oliver, whose lower reaches were still devoid of clothing and were still crowned by a magnificent boner. He saw that Oliver was trembling slightly at the thought of the unknown, but as he had posed no objections, he now pulled off the lad’s gym vest over his head, rendering him completely naked. For a few moments he gazed with lustful pleasure at the well-ripped body of his partner to be, for that is how he now viewed Oliver

He then dropped to his knees and took the head of Oliver’s mouth-wateringly attractive cock, already dripping with pre-cum, into his mouth. If Oliver was surprised, he certainly did not show it as Rufus systematically began to suck off the young-man. Oliver showed his appreciation of what was happening to him by emitting gentle moans of pleasure as Rufus steadily massaged his partner’s cock with his mouth towards climax. But before he allowed Oliver to reach orgasm, Rufus suddenly withdrew his mouth leaving him in a state, bordering on but no quite reaching, the heights of nirvana. He took Oliver by the hand and led him gently to his bedroom. He pulled back the top sheet, spread a large bath towel on the lower sheet and very gently pushed Oliver face down onto the bed.

A compliant Oliver docilely obeyed Rufus’s instructions and spread his legs to give access to his anus, which Rufus proceeded to lubricate carefully with a good dose of baby-oil. As Rufus performed the task he had done many times in preparing his first partner, Nigel Kingston for sex and which he himself had undergone times without number, he, nevertheless, shuddered at the intensity of the six stripes he had given Oliver. But the slight feeling of guilt he felt was quickly forgotten by the thrill to be preparing to fuck an arse which he had just beaten and which was still in its virgin, untouched state.

Oliver was to be only the second partner to feel the power of Rufus’s cock, with which, in its own way, he was as powerful when he fucked butt as he was with the cane. However, this would  be the first time that Rufus  would use his cock to initiate a guy who was still a virgin, into the joys of anal sex. And exactly as he had not held back when he was beating Oliver, he now intended to use his very best efforts to take his partner to a climactic orgasm for his first time. In much the same way as a year ago when Nigel Kingston had taken him under his sexual wing and introduce him the the pleasures of anal sex, he was hoping against hope that he could now do the same for Oliver.

In was a pity that their first meeting had had to involve such severe disciplinary action. But in spite of having thrashed Oliver’s arse and endowing him with the six, hideously painful, livid welts at which he was now looking, Rufus felt inexplicably drawn towards Oliver. Somehow he sensed that there was a great affinity between the two them.  Oliver had already acquiesced without complaint to Rufus’s first steps towards his ultimate goal to fuck him and the fact that he was now being allowed to anoint his potential partner’s virgin arse with lubricant without any resistance, did seem to indicate a certain mutuality of mind between the two of them. Certainly, Oliver was not objecting to Rufus’s ministrations on his arse.

Rufus had sunddenly taken a great liking to Oliver in whom he foresaw a future sex partner for the rest to the school year. Oliver certainly had all the physical attributes which any gay man could wish for in a sex partner. Rufus could hardly wait to finish what he was doing as at that very moment, there was nothing he wanted more in the world, than to sink his own man-meat into Oliver’s anus and introduce him to the pleasures of anal sex. Add to this the fact that his  cock, due to lack of a suitable partner, having been denied sexual access to a partner throughout the summer, was gasping for some action, the chances were that Oliver’s surrendering of his anal virginity would be a very significant act for both participants.

What Rufus did not know, however, was that Oliver, lying there allowing his future lover to prepare him for his initiation into the world of anal sex, was also looking forward to what was about to happen to him.  Slightly apprehensive, as is any young-man in the run up to his first time, Oliver was nevertheless pleased that things were turning out the way they appeared to be at the moment. A dedicated, lone wanker himself, for more the last eighteen months he had long wished to take things further.

Unbeknown to Rufus, Oliver was exactly in the state Rufus had been a year ago: a man’s man in waiting. Like Rufus, Oliver he had long known that he had eyes only for other men rather than for members of the opposite sex. And like Rufus he had done nothing to turn his timid desires into action. And so, exactly as Rufus had been taken in hand by Nigel Kingston, Rufus was now about to take him in hand.  Of course, Rufus was unaware that he had, by chance, stumbled across a very willing, if totally uninitiated, potential partner.

Oliver knew nothing about the relationship between Rufus and Nigel. But he did see that he had, by chance, become involved with an experienced sex operator, who was about to initiate him into the joys of male-male sex.  And so as Rufus massaged the lubricating oil into his anus, Oliver felt a glow of satisfaction pulse through body, in anticipation of what was about to happen to him.

And then, it all happened as Oliver had imagined. The lubrication phase was over and Rufus knelt behind him on the bed and pushed the head of his cock, which he had also doused with oil, against the anal entry port to Oliver’s private parts.  As an anal virgin, Oliver had a very tight anus, protected by what was clearly a strong sphincter. But with his considerable experience, Rufus did not hesitate to thrust his hard meat firmly against the resistant muscle, which quickly capitulated and allowed his well-lubricated cock to slide fully inside Oliver.

Like most young men, in the throes of having being penetrated for the first time, thereby surrendering their anal innocence forever, Oliver let out a cry of pain, as the invading tool brushed past his prostate. But once that momentary pain had passed, he relaxed and waited for the next stage in his initiation into the joys of anal sex.  And just as Oliver was eager to get himself fucked, so also was Rufus, deprived of sex over the long summer vacation, eager to fuck him. However, Rufus had never considered that his first fuck of the term as head-boy would be, metaphorically, equivalent to deflowering his partner.

Together, Rufus, the confirmed fucker, and Oliver, the prospective fuckee, were in perfect mental harmony for what was now about to happen.  This was an act to which Oliver had, by his acquiescence to the advances made by Rufus, unspokenly accepted. But it was also an act of which Oliver was unclear about the outcome.  Other than what he hoped would be the pleasure of feeling Rufus batter his arse and fuck-hole with his cock, what else could come out of the act they were engaged in?

Immediately after penetrating Oliver, Rufus has paused for a moment before beginning the forceful thrusting with which he would ultimately bring himself, and hopefully Oliver too, to his climax.  Rufus was as vigorous with his own rod as he gave Oliver his first fuck as had earlier been with the cane. With his long smooth strokes, he soon had Oliver moaning with pleasure.  Oliver suddenly climaxed, taking Rufus by complete surprise, as his partner suddenly reached his first orgasm and ejaculated an enormous quantify of his thick, creamy sperm all over the towel on which he was lying.  Rufus, who never fucked butt without taking himself to orgasm, continued pounding Oliver’s arse until, just a few moments later he himself exploded, and pumped is own generous load deep into his partner.

Rufus withdrew himself from Oliver and lay beside him flat on his back, resting for a few moments to recover from the effort he had just made. He then he whispered to Oliver that he should turn over onto his back, which Oliver did without any question.  Rufus immediately rolled over onto his knees, lifted Oliver’s legs over his own shoulders and proceeded to fuck him for a second time in the mission position.

This time, Rufus was able to control things better and he achieved his aim of bringing them both to a simultaneous orgasm as he withdrew his cock from Oliver’s anus, before thrusting his full length back with tremendous force. Once again the two of them, totally intoxicated by the sheer pleasure of the sex act, produced huge quantity of sperm.  Oliver pumped his own cream all over himself and onto Rufus’ chest, before Rufus, exhausted by his efforts fell across Oliver where the two of them became tantamount to being glued together in the copious quantities of spunk.

So that was how the two of them became what might best be described as an item of necessity for the three terms of their final year at St. Olaf’s. The only thing which drew them together was that Rufus want a regular partner to fuck and Oliver, once he had tasted the forbidden fruit of anal copulation, wanted to be fucked. And therein and lies the secret of their harmony.  Oliver wanted only to be fucked and not to exercise his cock on his partner Rufus.  He was quite content to allow Rufus to take him to climax and experience the undoubted pleasure of an orgasm which was produced by his partner, without ever wishing to do the same to Rufus.

When the two young men left St. Olaf’s for ever at end of the year, Oliver had never exercised his own cock on Rufus’s arse. He had never even suggested that he might like to try fucking Rufus, which suited Rufus down to the ground. The role of prime-mover imbued him with feeling of dominance. So when they they finally parted ways at the end of that final school year, Oliver’s cock remained in the virgin state of being Penis intactus. Oliver was, in modern day idiom, a natural, died-in-the wool bottom, a state with which he seemed to be totally satisfied sexually. 

Rufus, who in his earlier relationship with his teacher and mentor in matters sexual, Nigel Kingston, had been accustomed to a give and take relationship, was more than happy to play the dominant role with Oliver. In fact, in his sex life after he had left school, that tyrannical streak in his makeup, was to exert itself and in all his future sexual relationships, he was a dedicated top: he fucked others but was never fucked back. There was nothing reciprocal about his sex life, into which neither love nor mutuality entered.

CHAPTER 15

Subsequent to Oliver’s first time, he and Rufus were regular sexual communicants, and managed to have sex at least twice a week for the rest of the school year.  Rufus thrashed his way through a large number of his schoolmates and, as already indicated, by the time he left St. Olaf’s was generally considered be the greatest bastard in the living memory of those who had experienced his largesse with the cane.

But when Oliver and Rufus left St. Olaf’s at the end of the year, it was as if their liaison had never existed.  There were none of the finer feelings of friendship between them which might have developed from their regular sexual intimacy. Each of them had used the other as a foil to satisfy his own sexual needs: Rufus to fuck and Oliver to be fucked. So, when they left the school, that was that.  They each went their separate ways; Oliver to Cambridge to read mathematics and Rufus to Oxford to read Greats. They never ever met again!

That autumn, Rufus went up to Oxford to read what is called Greats: essentially the study of Greek and Roman civilisations, philosophy and languages. As a member of the esteemed Gresham College, Rufus quickly attracted the attention of his tutor, due to his extraordinary ability with the languages of ancient Greece and Rome, both of which he spoke, read and wrote as if they were his mother tongue. But probably the most gratifying aspect of his life at Oxford was that he met up again with his original sexual partner form St.Olaf’s, Nigel Kingston.

As Kingston, a year older than Rufus, had left St. Olaf’s the previous year the two young men had since had no contact. In that year, Rufus’s carnal needs had been satisfied by the liaison he had developed with Oliver Crawford, who himself had now gone on to read mathematics at Cambridge.

Both Nigel and Rufus were delighted to be able to renew the relationship which they had enjoyed together at St. Olaf’s. Somehow the two young men had seemed destined for each other at school and the year’s rupture in their relationship was forgotten on their first meeting in Oxford. Throwing caution to the winds, they both finished up in Nigel’s bed, where they fucked each other with a vigour which testified to their mutual desire.

But Nigel, the erstwhile mentor, quickly realised,  as Rufus vigorously attacked – yes that is the right the word – his hole with his rock-hard cock, that his student had become a truly professional and dedicated practitioner of the art of anal sex. Nigel saw immediately that he had nothing more to teach Rufus, who, as is often the case, was now the equal of his former mentor. 

Nigel, in his first year at Oxford, had not let the grass go under the feet of his sex life and by the time that Rufus arrived the following year, he already had a number of like-minded young men with whom he was having sex on a regular basis. But Nigel came very quickly to appreciate that when it came to sex, Rufus was head and shoulders above any of his other sex partners in Oxford. 

Nigel also saw that Rufus had clearly become a man who wanted to dominate his partner. And so it was that their relationship quickly turned from one of mutuality, in which they both fucked each other, to one in which Rufus dominated as the sole active partner.  But so intoxicated with Rufus’s proficiency in using his cock and the utterly exquisite orgasms which the young-man was capable of giving him, Nigel quickly accepted that their relationship had now become one in which he was the subordinate partner.

Like many young homosexual men, Rufus made hay whilst the sun was shining and, thanks to Nigel, who introduced him to most of his like-mined friends, he quickly developed a very active and satisfying sex life as a new undergraduate. His prowess with his cock quickly earned him the reputation as being one of the best tops around and, as such, he was in great demand at many of the group sex parties which were a regular feature of the life practised by the milieu in which he moved.

In spite of his dedication to the pleasures of gay sex, he was nevertheless a very diligent student and his tutors quickly realised that they had a star on their hands. But although sexually and academically, Rufus’s life at Oxford was very satisfactory, one thing was sadly missing from his daily existence: the lack of boys to beat. 

Rufus’s final two years at St. Olaf’s, first as a junior prefect and then as head-boy, had brought out and allowed him to indulge in that tyrannical streak in his nature. In a word, even at school, he had already become what can best be described as a strict disciplinarian. Even as a junior prefect he had already acquired a notorious reputation for his devotion to the cane. But as head-boy, in a position of loco magistri, beating of boys naked arses had become a practice bordering on an obsession.

But now, as an undergraduate at Oxford, with no conveniently youthful buttocks around to beat, he felt completely deprived of an act which had, at St. Olaf’s had become, almost like the air he breathed,  part of his daily life. However, an extraordinary life-line came shortly before Christmas, in the form of a letter from Mr. Bernard B. Hamilton, his former Headmaster at St. Olaf’s, who wrote:

Dear Rothery,

I trust you are adapting to your new life at Oxford. Your teachers here at St. Olaf’s always spoke very highly of your abilities at the classics, which I believe is the course you are now reading at Oxford.

As you are no doubt aware, having, I believe, been subjected to it yourself, St. Olaf’s operates a system whereby boys, whose parents cannot, for some reason or another, accommodate them during the  school vacations, are cared for by the school in loco parentis.

In this context, we are looking, for the first time, to appoint a Vacation Tutor to supervise these boys over the Christmas, Easter and summer vacations.  It occurred that me that you would be ideal for this temporary post whilst you are still at university.

Left to their own devices during the vacations, the boys have a remarkable tendency to display an alarming degree of disregard both of the rules (which are still enforced out of term) and people in general. It is, therefore, my earnest belief that the boys still require the supervision of a strict disciplinarian such as you have shown yourself to be during your final two years at St. Olaf’s first as a junior prefect and latterly as head-boy. So even though these boys are not attending classes, a short, sharp shock with the cane, if they misbehave, will not come amiss.

Your prowess with the cane is still spoken of in hushed tones by those who knew you as head-boy and is generally considered to be a bench-mark by which your immediate successor is, no doubt, being judged.

The post is, of course, temporary but is generously remunerated and you will be provided with suitable accommodation. In in fact, the head-boy’s study, with which you are familiar, will be at your disposition. All meals and laundry services will be provided and travel costs to and from Oxford will, of course, be reimbursed.

Perhaps you would be good enough to let me know whether or not this offer interests you.  I think that you will find that St. Olaf’s vacation dates fit in well with those of Oxford, and you will of course be able to devote your free time to your university course work.

With kindest personal regards,

Yours sincerely

B. B. Hamilton

Headmaster

Rufus could barely contain his excitement on reading this letter. Of course, he wrote promptly back to the Headmaster to tell him that he would be delighted to accept his offer. That evening he could not wait to share the good news with Nigel Kingston, who, in his own way had been as keen a disciplinarian and had taught Rufus what might be termed the tricks of the trade when it came to wielding the cane.  And when, a little later, they lay in bed together, Rufus gave Nigel’s arse a truly monumental pounding in celebration of his good-luck.

So for the next three years, Rufus spent term time at Oxford, where he exercised his undoubted sexual abilities on Nigel Kingston and, after his departure on graduation, on several other like-minded young men, all of whom were delighted to count Rufus as one of their sex partners.  But his vacations, for the next three years, were now spent at St. Olaf’s, when he took every opportunity which presented itself to thrash the naked arses of his charges. This provided a lifeline to his perpetual, but secret, obsession with the cane.

CHAPTER 16

Rufus graduated from Oxford with high honours; a starred first no less. And, due to his extraordinary brilliance, was immediately offered a research fellowship by his college.  But an academic career was not at all what Rufus had in mind. He was so fixated by his desire to use the cane on the naked arses of schoolboys, that he knew he wanted to be a school master in a traditional English public school for boys, where he could exercise his secret passion.

He did not have far to look as Mr. Hamilton, the Headmaster of St. Olaf’s, who was one of Rufus’s most ardent admirers, offered him the post of junior classics master and assistant housemaster of one of the four houses of the school. So Rufus Rothery returned, with no hesitation at all, to a permanent teaching post at his old school.

It is doubtful if the Headmaster, Mr. Hamilton, one of Rufus’s greatest admirers, realised just what he had done, in appointing him to a teaching post and making him at the same time assistant housemaster of Plato House, the house to which Rufus had himself belonged as a pupil at the school.  The Headmaster had always admired the strict discipline which Rufus had displayed, first as a junior prefect and then as head-boy. And his good opinion of Rufus had been strengthened by the previous years he had spent as vacation tutor at the school, where his adherence to the rules had allowed him to keep the exuberance of the boys in check.

However, what the Headmaster in all probability did not realise was just how brutal Rufus had become in his use of the cane. Nor was he aware of Rufus’s sexual orientation, which, at that time, was strictly illegal and could lead to penal consequences. But against this was the other side to Rufus’s character: his devotion to the classics and his fervent desire to show his students that although the two languages, ancient Greek and Latin, might be dead and no longer spoken, their philosophy and literature was still very much alive and well.

Rufus quickly established himself as being one of the best teachers in the school. He had that knack, which few teachers have, of injecting life into what, for most boys were two boring subjects: Greek and Latin. 

But much as he was liked by the boys in his classes, he rapidly became to be feared in his role of assistant housemaster of Plato House. The housemaster, his superior, was an elderly man, who had taught history at St. Olaf’s longer than anyone could remember. Now on the verge of retirement, he was happy to leave the day-to-day running of the house to his newly arrived, young colleague, whom he had himself taught as a boy at the school only a few years previously.

As a young bachelor, Rufus was provided with a study, a sitting room, a bedroom and a bathroom.  The assistant housemaster’s study soon became a feared destination for any boy who was deemed by Rufus to be in need of what he euphemistically referred to as correction.  Rufus was quick to establish a ritual that the boys destined to have their arses whacked, were obliged to follow. To be invited to what the denizens of Plato House quickly dubbed the PPP, was soon to be considered as a fate worse than death.

The PPP, short for Pyjama Punishment Party, was appropriately so named by the boys. Rufus had decided that he would administer all formal beatings in the evening, before the boys went to bed. And so the PPP ritual was established. The younger boys, who were to have the dunious pleasure of submitting their naked bottoms to the bite of Rufus’s cane, were summoned to his study at eight, to be followed by the older boys, at nine in the evening. But whatever the witching hour, all boys were required to take their evening shower and report to Rufus’s study, wearing only their pyjamas, dressing gowns and bedroom slippers.

Thus conveniently attired for what was about to be visited on their soon-to-be-naked arses, they stood, trembling, outside the door of Rufus’s study, waiting to be called in, one-by-on, to meet their fate. And what a fate many of them had in store, for Rufus, never less than generous with his dispensation of what he saw as justice, had a very refined and carefully calibrated technique with the cane. To repeat a well know maxim, if ever the punishment was tailored to fit the crime – if the boys’ misdemeanours could even be called crimes – then Rufus dispensed an appropriate level of punishment.

As assistant housemaster Rufus was allowed, totally at his discretion, to give up to a maxim of eighteen strokes of the cane on the bare to any boy whom he deemed merited it.  As an absolute minimum, no boy ever escaped with less than six classic parallel cuts laid on across both bare buttocks. But quite frequently, Rufus then added two cross- cuts to gate the picture he had just etched onto a lad’s bare arse.  This became the hallmark of Rufus’s punishments for the younger boys where it rapidly became known among the boys as the gated eight.

He was meticulous in seeing that every cut was applied parallel to its predecessor so that when he had finished, the poor lad in question was left sporting an undoubted, if painful,  masterpiece of flagellative art to show his room-mates in the inevitable post-beating viewing. It is safe to say that even boys with only a minor offense to their name, never left Rufus’s study without that hallmark of a public school beating; a well-beaten arse.

But just a straight beating did not seem anything like enough for those offenders, who were regular, if reluctant frequenters  participators in Rufus’s PPP evenings.  Rufus had another treat up his sleeve, one which he reserved for older boys, particularly repeat offenders. This was what came to be known to the boys as the double six, or even, on occasions, when he felt the offence justified it, the double nine.

This excruciatingly painful punishment involved placing all strokes, more or less, one on top of the other. I say, more or less, because even Rufus, in spite of his desire to inflict the maximum pain, realised that if he truly placed every stroke in the same place, he risked inflicting serious damage on the lad’s backside.

So all strokes were delivered within a small band about two inches wide on a lad’s lower buttocks, thereby ensuring that he would not sit down comfortably for several days.. Aesthetically less pleasing to the eye than the classic, well beaten arse of neatly placed parallel strokes, the one livid, two inch wide band as a result of stroke on stroke, was decidedly more painful.

But as if this was not enough, Rufus went still further in his desire to inflict the maximum pain. For the repeat offender, true die-in the-wool recidivist, for whom the dreaded, maximum, eighteen-stroke beating was reserved, Rufus added a new twist in what became to be called the triple six.  Used even by Rufus only rarely, the poor lad, who was to be subjected to this truly horrific punishment, was first given six parallel cuts, placed from top to bottom of his arse.

A pause of five minutes then ensued, during which time the unfortunate receipt of the beating was left bent across the chair, his arse, which he was forbidden by Rufus to touch, already aflame.  The next six cuts were then overlaid exactly, one on one, on the existing six stripes, before after another pause of five minutes, the third set of six strokes was then overlaid on the existing stripes.

Just try to imagine the pain the poor recipient must have been suffering by the time Rufus had finished embellishing his arse with the cane. Six apparent stripes, each the result of three, overlaid strokes. In barely bears thinking about. Whilst at that time, the cane was in regular use throughout the English public school system, Rufus’s obsessive use of the rod of justice went a step too far. And as we shall see, it led to his undoing at St. Olaf’s school.

CHAPTER 17

But what of that other important element in Rufus’s life: sex? On leaving Oxford, Rufus had also left behind the group of like-minded young men with whom he had had sex on a regular basis.  But now, moving back to St. Olaf’s, located near the town of Kendal in the Lake District, he had no immediate sex contacts.  But this was the other key aspect of his life which could not be neglected, as along with his dedication for thrashing boys’ naked arses, sex was his other great passion: something without which he, like most men,  did not want to live.

Sex, both gay and hetero, is available pretty-well everywhere and

even in superficially genteel country towns like Kendal, every form of sexual taste was catered for. Sex, is a universally available commodity and in Kendal, a public house, the Cumbria Arms, as the place was called, was a well-known watering spot for the local fraternity of – putting it politely – mens’ men!  But the Cumbria Arms, as Rufus was later to learn, in spite of its reputation as a focal point for many of the young homosexual men of the area, was, in fact,  a high quality establishment, which by maintaining high prices for its services, kept the less desirable elements of the town at bay.

So the end of his first week at St. Olaf’s, Rufus found himself standing alone at the saloon bar in the Cumbria Arms. In spite of its upmarket appearance, the Cumbria had, nevertheless, like most public houses, a public bar, where anyone, dressed as they wished, could enter.  Like many establishments dispensing beer, the bar itself, from which drinks were served, was central to both the saloon and public bars. So customers in both rooms could see one another across this central serving bar.

As Rufus picked up his drink, he glanced across into the public bar, where his eye lighted upon a handsome young-man, quite roughly dressed, who was standing holding his drink. There is a saying that it takes one to know one.  Well, Rufus knew immediately that the young-man was one of them. But what was more important was that he somehow knew this stranger, whom he had only just seen, and he himself were destined for each other.  And then, as if by magic, the young man looked straight across the intervening void of the bar and smiled directly at Rufus.

Rufus returned the smile where upon the young-man moved his head, almost imperceptibly – but the invitation was clearly given – and then moved away from the bar towards the street door. Rufus rapidly finished off his drink and left the place by the saloon-bar door, to find the young-man with whom he was acquainted by only the merest of come-on nods, was already waiting for him in the street.  Having responded to the young-man’s obvious sign of encouragement, Rufus now found himself somewhat embarrassed standing there, next to a complete stranger, but one with whom he just knew, as his cock was already telling him, that he wanted to have sex.

He need not have worried as the young-man took took the lead saying, in a strong northern, working-class accent: “You are new around these parts, I think, as I have not seen you in the Cumbria before tonight.   But just looking at you across the bar, I somehow guessed that you might be just like me: someone looking for a bit of action. Now, please don’t take that the wrong way. If I have made a mistake, then we can part here and now, with no harm done.”

“But my guess is that as you have responded to my nod and we are now standing together outside this pub, that I am right and that you are looking for sex. So how do you stand? Am I right? Are you or aren’t you on the prowl? And oh, by the way, my name is Thomas –Tom to everyone – Swires?” And with that, Rufus’s future putative sex-partner offered Rufus his hand saying “How do you do?”

Rufus was completely and utterly taken aback by this refreshingly and totally frank and unsolicited approach to the question of homosexual sex, an act which was totally illegal under the then law of the land and punishable by imprisonment. Talk about calling a spade a spade; this young-man had just called a spade a shovel! But Tom Swires had sized-up Rufus exactly.  Just as Rufus had divined that the young-man he had just seen across the bar was a man’s-man, man, so had he too been identified by Tom Swires as being tarred with the same brush.

How do homosexual young-men men recognised each other as such so immediately on first sight, and have an immediate desire, as in this case, to have sex with the each other? I suppose it’s much the same as the phenomenon known as love at first sight, which some heterosexual couples claim to have experienced. But in the case of mens’-men it is more likely that the fatal attraction is based on what is best described as lust on first sight.

Well whatever the source of his motivation, Tom Swires had correctly sized up Rufus as a man’s-man and, moreover, a man’s-man on the prowl. But as the saying goes, it takes two to tango. The moment that Tom Swires had clapped his eyes on Rufus across the bar, he was just as ready to have sex with Rufus as Rufus was with him. That inexplicable, but instantaneous, fatal attraction had immediately worked its magic on both of them and the outcome was already pre-ordained.

Rufus looked for a moment at the outstretched hand, which he then shook, thereby making his first physical contact with his future sex partner. But on that simple handshake, the customary gesture of greeting which is performed regularly with no sexual motivation whatsoever behind it, it was as though an electric shock was running through Rufus’s body.  Rufus felt his cock, which, as ever, in its totally incontrollable way, was already telling him what it wanted, stirring between his legs as he fumbled the first words he would address to Tom Swires.

Finally after a moment’s pause, as he was shaking Tom’s hand he managed to mumble the traditional greeting:  “How do you do?”  The two of them then looked intently at one another until Rufus, by that time more composed and sure of himself, continued: “Well Tom, my name is Rufus and just allow me to say how much I admire your frank approach to what is always a delicate subject. Tom, I have to tell you that you are quite right. I did go into the Cumbria Arms this evening looking for sex, which I gather from your remarks I have found. So, where do we go from here?”

Tom Swires took Rufus’s question at face value without regard for any other interpretation that could be placed on it and said: “Well Rufus, I don’t live very far from here. So if you are agreeable why don’t we go back to my place and take it from there? 

Rufus, by now fully aware that he was in the hands of a very decisive personality, meekly allowed himself to be led to Tom’s abode, which turned out to be a small, comfortable flat located above the offices of a jobbing builder called Williams & Son Ltd, by whom Tom was employed as a master brick-layer. 

By way of an explanation as they ascended the external staircase leading to the flat on the first floor, Tom said: “I’m actually the charge-hand over the other bricklayers and Mr. Williams offered me this place to live in. I’m, really very lucky to have my own place, rent-free, in fact. So I don’t have the problem of my mother breathing down my neck all the time and can do exactly as I want.”

Rufus realised that in allowing himself to be seduced by Tom, which is exactly what was happening, he was, for the first time in his privileged life, having social contact with a member of the working class, which in the extremely class-ridden structure of England at that time, was something which was tantamount to being unthinkable. But unthinkable or not, that is exactly what was happening. Indeed it was obvious that now that that first social barrier had been breached, the next step, in which they would indulge in the forbidden act of sex, was inevitable.

In the England of the early twentieth century, there was a place for everyone and everyone knew his place.  Society was then as divided by class and religion, as it is today by race.  But none of the social conventions of the moment seemed of the slightest importance, as Rufus gazed lustfully upon Tom Swires.  He just knew, come what may, the two of them were destined, by force of circumstances, to fuck each other that evening. As he now took a closer look at Tom Swires, Rufus was more and more attracted by what he saw.

Tom and he were about the same age and height and both of them were extremely good looking young-men, which is possibly what had been the focus of their instant mutual attraction. But as he looked upon his soon-to-be sex partner, Rufus was already hard with the prospect of the pleasure shortly to come. So still slightly embarrassed by the situation, Rufus repeated the sentence which had brought them to Tom’s flat: “So Tom, where do we now go from here?”

Tom Swires, who quite evidently was totally at ease and relaxed in the situation in which he found himself, even though he was addressing someone whom he would term a toff, looked at Rufus as if he had a hole in the head before saying: “Look my friend, just get real. We both know why we came here so why don’t we just get on with it and see how we get on together? Come on. Rufus, we both know we want to fuck, so what’s stopping us?

Then before Rufus could answer, Tom started stripping off his clothes and in a  few seconds was standing there, totally unembarrassed, stark naked. If ever a young man was comfortable in his skin, it was Tom Swires.  He had a beautifully ripped, bronzed body which testified to his work as a bricklayer in the open air, stripped to the waist. And very refreshingly, Tom was evidently not ashamed of his sexual orientation. His cock, now freed from the restriction of his underpants, stood proudly, fully erect at an angle of 45 degrees to his body above a pair of well proportioned balls. This was a sex cannon which would have rendered any observer wild with admiration, not to mention jealousy, as it was given to few men to possess such a sexually potent gem.

As Rufus gazed with admiration on Tom, in all his naked, young, muscular glory, he could barely wait to rip of his own clothes and fuck the young man. Tom had not been slow in coming forward in the Cumbria Arms and now, naked as he was, his entire demeanour was just asking for sex. Rufus’s first act was to drop to his knees and take Tom’s inviting erection in his mouth.  But as he prepared to suck off the young man, he saw for the first time that his new partner had been circumcised. This was something that Rufus had never before encountered in his sexual activities, neither  with Nigel Kingstown, Oliver Crawford nor any of the many young men at Oxford with whom he had had sex.

Circumcision was then, as it still is today, relatively rare among English males. Beauty as we all know, is in the eyes of the beholder, and at that very moment, Tom’s cock was, for Rufus, the most beautiful piece of male man-meat he had ever seen.  Devoid of the distracting foreskin, which usually completely masks the male cock-head, Tom’s penis looked absolutely superb in all its erect glory. His cockhead, thus free of its normal encumbrance, appeared enormous and was set off from the shaft be a well defined rim.

Rufus’s oral efforts on Tom’s cock soon produced results in the form of an enormous, orgasmic ejaculation of sperm. It was evident from the vigorous way in which Tom’s spunk spurted forth in great, creamy gobbets of thick cum that he had been truly psyched up for sex before Rufus had even touched him.  Rufus stood up, wiped off the sperm which he had taken full face due to Tom’s dynamic delivery.  He stood there a moment, wondering what the next step in their relationship was to be.

He need not have worried, however, as Tom, clearly an inveterate master of ceremonies, yet again took the lead and said:  “Over there, in the bathroom, there is a bottle of baby oil on the shelf. Just make sure that you lubricate my arse and your own tool very well, before you shaft me.”

So there it was. Tom wanted Rufus to fuck him.  There had been no discussion at all, as to who would do what to whom. Tom, with that characteristic decisiveness which he had displayed from the first moment they had met, demonstrated that although he was offering his arse to Rufus to fuck, he was still, very much in charge. And as Rufus was to learn, Tom, in spite of his total command of the situation, turned out to be a dedicated bottom.

Tom led Rufus by the hand into his bedroom, where he knelt on the bed, spread his legs and waited for Rufus to complete the preliminaries to their first act of anal sex together. Rufus docilely did as he had been told. He carefully lubricated Tom’s hole and his own cock liberally with the oil, before sliding his full length gently through Tom’s tight little anus and giving him the full length of his hard meat. As he sank his full length deep inside of Tom and bottomed his pelvis firmly against Tom’s buttocks, Tom let out a gentle moan of pleasure.

Rufus, although he had so far been followed Tom’s lead, now suddenly found himself in the dominant position. So, with Tom’s arse now subservient to his cock, he gave his new partner a magnificently thorough fuck.  And let us be quite clear about it. When Rufus fucked he was as thorough and vigorous as he was with the cane when he beat boys’ naked arses.  What was so perfect for Rufus about what was happening, was that although following Tom’s instructions, at the end of the day he was, nevertheless, the prime mover in the act; he was fucking Tom and not the inverse.  

Although Tom’s decisiveness had led to the present situation, he was now totally content to play what was the subservient role in their first act of copulation together. Of course, what, at that moment, Rufus did not know, was that Tom was a dedicated bottom. He was one of those guys who wanted to be fucked but preferred not to be called upon to perform the act himself.  So quite unbeknown to the two of them, theirs was potentially a match made in heaven.  Rufus wanted to fuck rather than to be fucked, whilst Tom wanted to be fucked rather than to exercise his own meat fucking his partner. Add to that the fact that there had been that immediate mutual attraction between the two of them – that lust on first sight syndrome – what better match could there be?

As soon as Rufus began in earnest to fuck him, Tom quicklyrealised that he was in the metaphorical hands of a master craftsman. From the moment of penetration, he sensed that he was about to experience something quite remarkable. No beginner to anal sex, Tom sensed, as soon as Rufus thrust his man-meat into his fundamental orifice, that he was in the hands of an expert cocks-man which presaged a remarkable ride.

But equally, as Rufus began to give Tom’s tight little anus its first taste of what was to be a definitively a vigorous fuck, he sensed that this was to go beyond the bounds of a casual fuck. From the first moment of penetration as he felt Tom’s powerful anal muscles gripping his cock tightly, he knew that every stroke he delivered in this, their first act of copulation together was to be a magically sensuous moment. Fucking Tom Swires was to be hard work, but with a tremendous reward at the end, which was well worth the effort.

Rufus thrust his cock in and out of Tom’s arse, with ever increasing stroke length, force and speed.  Then, when he sensed from Tom’s panting that he had brought  him to the verge of his climax, he withdrew himself completely, waited a second and then thrust the full-length of his man-meat back into his partner, bringing them both to gigantic orgasms in which they both pumped out their semen if there was to be no tomorrow.

Rufus finally withdrew his cock from Tom’s anus and flopped onto his back alongside him. Tom, whose body was glistening with sweat, too rolled over onto his back and the two of them lay there, gazing in what can but be described as in rapture at each other. Tom had never felt anything even vaguely approaching what he had just experienced from Rufus. But Rufus too, realised that in Tom he too had, quite by chance, fallen on a unique sex partner.

Experience as he was in anal sex, he had never before had  partner like Tom, whose anal muscles were so strong that they exerted a firm grip on his cock and ensured that that prime mover ion the sex act was well and truly massaged throughout their entire union. Was it this fact that had led to such explosive orgasms for both young men?  But Rufus knew one thing for sure; he had never ever before fucked anyone who had even remotely given him personally such satisfaction as he had had from this first fuck with Tom. 

Tom suddenly rolled over and pressed his body against Rufus’s and kissed him firmly on the mouth before uttering the first words since the start of their union:  “Rufus, you really are the tops. You are not, by a long chalk, the first guy to have fucked me and so I know what I am talking about.  Just let me tell you that I have never before been shafted in the way you did to me just now.  Frankly, I can barely remember a time when my partner of the moment took me to such erotic heights of sheer pleasure with his dick as you did just now and brought me all the way to the very best orgasm I can ever remember. I only hope that it was as good for you.”

“Rufus, I felt when I saw you across the bar just a little while ago in the Cumbria Arms, that you were someone special and what you just did to, but also, for me, was quite exceptional. There is a saying that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, Well, all I can say, is that I have eaten my first helping and would like some more.  So, my friend, if you feel up to it (not said as such, but nevertheless, always a challenging phrase when it comes to sex), my anus is again at your disposal. So please, please Rufus, fuck me again right now.”

Rufus had of course enjoyed fucking Tom just as much as Tom had enjoyed being fucked. So without saying a single word, Rufus pulled himself up from the bed, knelt down again in front of Rufus, who was still on his back, pulled his legs apart and raised them over his shoulder. Then with one smooth movement, he shafted his partner for the second time that evening and proceeded to fuck him in the mission position.

The synergy of desire between the two of them was such that Rufus quickly brought Tom to his second climax. This time, Rufus then collapsed onto his partner and the two of them just clung to each other, cemented together by a large quantity of Tom’s semen, which he had sprayed all over his well muscled abdomen. After a brief pause, the two of them lay again, side by side, with Tom now looking adoringly at his new partner.

CHAPTER 18

Tom now reached out and took Rufus’s cock, which was still standing to attention,  his left hand, gave it a few gentle strokes as if to thank it for the extreme pleasure which it had just given him. Then by way of showing Rufus that he was not totally supine in their newly forged relationship, he leaned across Rufus, took his cock in his mouth and then in a delicate act of true fellatio, brought Rufus to his third orgasm of the evening. As Rufus ejaculated his third load of sperm, Tom took the entire emission in his mouth and swallowed it. So he had now taken Rufus’s sperm twice up his arse and once orally, all within the space of half an hour.

Rufus was amazed by Tom’s actions. He had not suggested that he give Rufus a return bout of anal sex by shafting Rufus with his cock. But somehow, in sucking Rufus off, Tom had managed to indicate that he was satisfied with what had just passed between them. Tom, although sexually very active,  was a confirmed bottom and somehow by this act of oral sex, he had imparted that fact to Rufus.  Quite frankly, given the fact that Rufus, with his dominating streak, infinitely preferred to fuck rather to be fucked, all signs augured well for the continuation and development of a long-term relationship.

But other than the fact that the two of them had had that incredible moment of recognition of mutual lust which had led to the position in which they were at present, Tom knew nothing about Rufus, other than  that from the way he spoke he spoke and dressed he was definitely upper class. And all that Rufus knew about Tom was that he was a bricklayer who lived above the offices of the jobbing builder for which he worked. So to all intents and purposes, what could have been a classic one night stand could have ended there. Rufus could have gone off, leaving Tom knowing only his Christian name, left him lying there in his bed and never seen him again.

But that attraction, which had drawn them together in the Cumbria Arms, was stronger than that. Although not as yet put into words, both Tom and Rufus knew that what had just happened between them was potentially the beginning of a durable relationship. The sex act between them had generated in both of them that rare feeling of satisfying complicity, which is not normally associated with a one night stand.  So lying together as they now were, wallowing in their joint semen, it was again Tom, wanting what was a chance meeting to turn into something more permanent, who took the lead.

“So Rufus, that was one hell of a good fuck you just gave me and I don’t even know your name or anything at all about you except that you are a toff.”

For non English readers of this story, England at the time this story I set was, and to some extent still is, a society riven apart by class. The word ‘toff’ is a British English slang word, a derogatory stereotype of someone with an aristocratic background or belonging to the landed gentry, particularly someone who exudes an air of superiority.

 But for Tom at that moment, Rufus was just someone who spoke in a better way than he himself did and who was better dressed. It was the brick-layer Tom, who had had no compunction at all in soliciting a man, at first sight, obviously of the upper classes, to whom he had been immediately attracted sexually. In such cases it is usually the toff who goes trawling for a quick fuck with any young stud who is willing.  But here it was Tom who had taken the lead and in so doing, had turned the usual onto its head.

But both Tom and Rufus were, nevertheless, aware that they were from completely different backgrounds and that there was an enormous, hitherto unspoken,  divide which separated them socially. However, naked in bed together as they had been, that divide had totally vanished and they behaved exactly as what they were: two, healthy young, studs who, mutually attracted, wanted to have sex with each other and had given way to their natural instincts, which are totally unrelated to class. There was no element of prostitution on the part of working-class Tom, as is frequently the case when young men men sell their sex for money.

But as they lay there naked, Tom had already articulated his inbuilt fears in observing that Rufus, his partner, who had just given him the fuck of his life was: a toff.

“Well,” said Rufus, “My name is Rufus Rothery and I am a school-teacher by trade.”  He had chosen the word, trade, rather than the more usual word, profession, in an attempt to create a level playing field between the two of them. He had not been insensitive to the latent fears expressed by Tom in describing him as a toff. He knew as well as Tom did that they were from totally different social classes. But he was so drawn sexually towards Tom, clearly a highly intelligent if uneducated young man, that he had no intention, come what may, of letting this marvellous young sex partner slip though his fingers.

“So, you a master at the grammar school in town then?” asked Tom.

“No Tom. In fact I am the junior classics master, teaching Latin and Greek at St. Olaf’s just on the edge of town. And additionally, I am also junior housemaster in one of the houses of the school.”

“Oh, so you’re at that posh boarding school where, rumour has it, they whack boys how misbehave on their naked arses with a cane.”

“Tom, let me assure you that what you had just said is more than a rumour: It’s a fact. St. Olaf’s takes obedience of its boys very seriously and any boy who steps out of line will find himself, with a very sore arse, very quickly. And yes it is quite true; the cane is always applied to a boy’s bare arse.  In fact, it is the standard usual practice in most public schools for boys in this country. It’s called beating on the bare and is something all public schoolboys, sooner or later, usually the former, have to come to terms with,”

“That must hurt the lads like bloody hell. I mean it sort of seems inhumane to whack a lad on his bare arse.”

“Tom, just let me assure you, there’s nothing at all inhumane about it. and I speak from personal experience. I went through the St. Olaf’s mill myself as a boy. In fact, apart from my years at University, I have spent my entire life since I was eight years old at St. Olaf’s, first as a pupil and now as a teacher. So I can tell you from my own personal experience, having had my own bare arse beaten by various prefects, my housemaster and occasionally by the Headmaster, that beating a boy on his naked arse with a cane, to teach him a lesson, has no long term bad effects.”

“And as you can see, I am alive and well and none the worse for having had my arse whacked times without number when I was a boy at the school.  You see Tom, just as a man’s arse lens itself admirably to sex, it is also a very convenient place to apply the cane. You can really lay on the cane, in the knowledge that a lad’s buttocks, which have no vital organs in them, can take any amount of of punishment. Sure, there is some bruising, as you cannot beat a boy’s arse without leaving some marks. But they soon disappear and the lad is none the worse for the experience. In fact, he usually has learned an important lesson, for a boy’s naked bum is as important as his eyes and ears in the learning process, when the teacher is a well applied rattan cane.

“You know, Rufus, the way you tell it makes it all sound so normal as if it’s just accepted a the way things are at such places. I can tell you, though, that it all sounds pretty horrific to me. I did not even go to a grammar school. But at the state school I went to, all the masters used the cane, which I got on my hands several times. And I can tell you that I did not like it. No not at all; not one tiny bit; it hurt like bloody hell.”

“Tom you are a highly perceptive guy and what you say about beating being part and parcel of the life at St. Olaf’s is quite true. But just let me tell you, that beating a boy on his bare arse with a flexible rattan cane, although a very painful occasion for the recipient,  is much less dangerous than whacking him across the palm of his hand with a rigid bamboo cane. A rigid bamboo cane can do much more damage, as it is hitting across the bony structure of a lad’s hand.  It’s quite true that a bare arse beating is painful. But it’s meant to be; pain is the name of the game when it comes to correcting a boy. And bare arse beatings have been part of the grand tradition of the English public school system for many, many years, and long may the practice endure.”

“So, Rufus, from what you have just said, I take it that you are in favour of the use of the cane. So do you yourself use the cane as a teacher at St. Olaf’s.”

“Indeed I do, Tom.  As assistant housemaster, I consider it my duty to discipline the boys in my care whenever they merit it, which I can tell you is quite often. So, in my house, the cane is in regular use, applied by me, with neither fear nor favour to all comers. The boys know what happens if they misbehave so on their own heads be it. They know that any misdemeanour will lead to what I like to think of as a dose of tender-loving-care from the cane, administered by me to their naked arses.  And not to want to boast to you, but I can say with no false modesty and considerable pride, that when I beat a boy he really knows he has been beaten. But you know, Tom, many of them come back for more. Some boys simply cannot keep themselves out of trouble.”

“My God, Rufus, he way you tell it, you really do sound bloodthirsty. Do you actually enjoy beating lads across their bare arses? And don’t you get tempted, especially with the older boys, to go beyond beating them and doing what you have just done to me. Come on, Rufus, tell all. Come on. I really want to know. After all, you are just like me: a pervert, a bugger, a sodomite and all the other nasty things they call us. So when you have beaten an older boy, a young man I suppose by the time they are in the top class at your school, and you have him, arse naked, over a chair or however you do it, do you never give way to the temptation, which must exist given the way you are, and fuck him?”

“Tom, there is a saying that curiosity killed the cat, with which you do not seem to be familiar. However seeing the position in which we find ourselves at present together, more or less drowning in our own cum, I will give you an answer in two words: strictly not!  As you perceptively observe, I am from time to time, although not that often, faced with beating a senior boy, who, as you also correctly observe, is more or less a young man.”

“But I absolutely never, ever have any sexual relationship with any of the lads I beat.  Now, I admit that, given by own sexuality, it is sometimes very difficult to resist with some of the senior boys. But I just never, ever give way to temptation.  My sex life, until tonight, when I met you, has been non-existent since I joined St.Olaf’s. Now it is a fact that in many public schools, which, in case you did not know it, are often seen as a safe haven from the law for people like me, long-term sexual relationships do exist between like minded masters.

“So, Tom, to lay this subject to rest. Yes, I admit that I do actually enjoy thrashing boys on their naked arses. No, I do not ever fuck any of them. And no at the present time, I do not have any sexual relationship with any of my present colleagues. Look Tom, I have just a couple of months ago, joined St. Olaf’s as a permanent teacher. To be quite honest with you, as you are really a very plain speaker, I have not had sex with anyone until tonight with you, since I left Oxford.  All my Oxford sex partners – and I kid you not, I had lots – I have not seen since I left there at the beginning of the summer; they are to all intents and purposes, part of my past.”

“So this evening having divined that the Cumbria Arms was the best male-male pick-up pace in town, I went there and that is how we came to meet. I can tell you honestly, Tom, that I have had a great time with you. Having been celibate for several months, I was truly desperate to fuck another man. And Tom, you are a really great fuck, by the way – in fact, the greatest. OK, so I jerked myself off in the meantime, to relieve my sexual tension, but as you must know yourself, masturbation is no substitute for a proper fuck. But what we two had together this evening, I found quite phenomenal. So Tom, if you feel the same way about me as I do about you after what is, after all, only our first meeting, I, for my part, see no reason why we should not continue our liaison.”

All the above dialogue between Rufus and Tom was said with the two protagonists lying facing each other on Tom’s bed.  From the look on Tom’s face, Rufus saw that his new partner welcomed this overture.  But he, nevertheless, went on to voice his own concerns for the future.

“Rufus, there is something which I have to tell you before we go any further. Like you, I am totally dedicated in my sex life to the art of what I suppose we might call anal fucking.  But as you have just seen  even though it was me who initiated our meeting and brought us together in  my bed, other than sucking you off, I have played only the submissive part in our relationship. It is you who have fucked me and not the inverse.  So you may probably be asking  yourself  why, after receiving two terrific fucks form you, I have not offered to do the same for you; to give you the pleasure of feeling my cock up your own arse.”

“Well, Rufus, I have a confession to make. You see, this evening you have, by chance, been fucking a guy who wants to only be fucked and not himself to fuck his partner. I am what is usually known as a dedicated bottom, which is to say, that I am totally satisfied by having my own hole reamed out by another guy, without the need for me to do the same for him.  I am telling you all this now, as you are proposing that we start a regular relationship based on one brief encounter. But given my own sexual preferences, you must see that I might not be able to satisfy your needs.”

“Now usually, that does not bother me too much. You see, Rufus, I have no regular long-term partner and my sex life consists of an irregular series of one night stands. I pick someone up for the evening, as I did with you tonight. We come back here and he fucks me once or twice and then moves on and that is that. But, if I am in a regular relationship, like that which you suggest, then things change. You have to be aware what you are letting yourself in for.”

“Rufus, I loved being fucked by you just now. You are absolutely the best and you took me to heights which I had never even dreamed existed.  What you did to me was give me the best sex I have ever experienced and I loved every minute of it. But the question is, now that you know how I am, can you yourself be satisfied with a relationship in which you do all the work; you fuck me, but I never fuck you. As I say, I have no regular partner – never have had – but given my own peculiarities, I wonder if I can match up to your needs.”

Listing to this – let us call it – confession, Rufus’s heart took a secret leap for joy. Here was a young man, with whom it would be foolish to pretend there was not a definite synergy, who was a wonderful fuck and who had just said that he did not want to fuck his partner back. Given Rufus’s streak for domination in all things, including being the dominant partner in any sexual relationship, Tom’s foible was like a gift from heaven.  Rufus was more than willing to fuck a dedicated bottom as he derived his own sexual satisfaction in experiencing the orgasms which he expertly generated in himself and is partner.

So Rufus, who was as dedicated a bugger as was Tom, could not have found a potentially better partner had he been trying. Here was a young man, whom Rufus liked tremendously. As Rufus saw it, theirs was not to be a relationship where they would live together, but rather one of a long term sexual liaison, where each of them enjoyed what the other had to offer. And even though one of them,  even though one of them played the active role permanently, they would be very much equal partners.

Tom, of course, was totally unaware of Rufus’s own proclivities in sexual matters.  Rufus had said nothing at all as Tom had poured out his thoughts and misgivings. But he then looked at the clock and said: “Tom, it’s getting late and I need to get back to the school. I see you have arranged yourself a large shower. So why don’t we get a shower together and clean off the results of our joint efforts. The I can get dressed and get on my way as it’s a long walk back to the school.”

If Tom was disappointed not to have had a reaction to the doubts he had voice, he did not show it. The two young men disentwined themselves from each other and moved into the shower. Whether by design or accident, Tom, a builder by trade, had installed himself a large shower, in which the two of them stood together comfortably under an abundant flow of hot water – a great rarefy at the time the action of this story is taking place.

Tom had, of course, no idea of what was about to happen to him. But Rufus, whose cock was already hardening at the thought of what he was about to do to his partner, suddenly, without any warning, swung Tom around thrust his hard fuck-stick deep into Tom’s anus.

Then with his customary vigour, he brought the young man to his third orgasm of the evening.  Tom pumped out yet other enormous emission of his semen, which was washed away under the flow of the water. Rufus, meanwhile, shot his own load deep inside of Tom, thereby cementing their nascent relationship in a very significant way.

“Well Tom, does that answer your question?  Tom, you are a great fuck, the greatest I think I have ever experienced.  Our chance meeting tonight in the Cumbria, must have been pre-ordained by God. And if you think, for one single moment, Tom, that your being a bottom is going to stop me attempting to develop a long term relationship with you, you are sadly mistaken. One sign of resistance from you, my friend, and I’ll treat that lovely arse of yours to a dose of the cane. And make no mistake, Tom, I am as good with the cane as I am with my cock when it comes to dealing with a guy’s are. It’s just that if push ever comes to shove, and you want to try it out, you will find the bite of the cane a much less agreeable experience to taking my cock up your arse.”

And that is how the chance meeting of Rufus Rothery, an upper-class public school master, and Thomas Swires, a working-class bricklayer, was turned into an enduring relationship.

CHAPTER 19

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