If you go down to the woods today…
…you’ll find that spring is sprung. So Haron was dragged off into the local forest at lunchtime, scissors in hand, to cut the first switches of the year from the birch trees. It took about eight of them to make a robust birch rod (a couple of firm rods to give it backbone, the rest lighter and more whippy), neatly trimmed then tied firmly with string.
She was Violet. Her parents were working abroad, so she’d been sent to stay with her father’s best friend (now a schoolmaster) for the Easter holiday. Her behaviour since she’d arrived had been typical of stroppy 15-year-old: at turns argumentative and sulky. Breaking a vase, on purpose, was the final straw.
We talked: I was disappointed. It was a shame, I said, that such a lovely young girl was growing up so defiant; I reflected on how sweet she’d been when she’d been little. I asked how her father dealt with her when she misbehaved (knowing all too well that the slipper was his implement of choice); there was even a confession of being caned at school. I used the birch on students in my house at school, I explained, and that was how I was going to deal with her now – with her father’s full permission.
Her trousers and panties came down, and up she went over the pillows on the middle of the bed. And then she was birched. Slowly, firmly. A birching breaks her very easily: by the third or fourth stripe, the young lady’s insubordination is long gone.
I’d awarded her ten strokes. If the girl starts to struggle by the fourth, “six of the best” allows her solace from the fact that her whipping is almost complete: with ten, on the other hand, her punishment has hardly started. A meek, apologetic Violet struggled her way through the flogging: yelping, struggling, shamed. Brave, very brave.
We talked before the final blow: she assured me that she would be the proverbial “good girl” in future. And then the last stroke was laid, and Violet was climbing up from the bed, wincing as she pulled up her clothing, obediently returning the birch to its home in my study.
And then Haron was back, and we could cuddle…