Priscilla's feet, tummy and brain all seemed to both equally confused and equally at odds with themselves. The headmaster's remark, oddly normal in its tone, that it was now her turn to be caned, had penetrated her mind like the screech with which Anna had responded to her first stroke. Suddenly she knew what was happening. But her tummy was filled with leaden butterflies. She felt almost sick. And her feet were simply rooted to the floor. For a moment she simply stared open-mouthed back at the headmaster.

***

For his part, the headmaster looked merely mildly surprised and a bit irritated. But he was extremely well practiced at disguising his feelings and he, in fact, was also in a very unaccustomed state of uncertainty. His punishment of Anna had not concluded in the manner that he had hoped. The prospect of caning these two very attractive young women in the same session had brought him to a more than usually excited state. He had felt a strange need to get specially prepared and even had taken a special bath and dressed himself in fresh clothes, though short of time, before hurrying upstairs to his disciplinary office to meet with the school nurse, just before the hour of the girls' appointment arrived.

Caning Anna had indeed afforded him great pleasure. He knew she was regarded as one of the prettiest senior girls in the school and he had been able to have her undress completely (except for her socks - this was a detail that he always enjoyed) and present her bottom for a caning that had originally been declared to be 18 strokes, and which he had not only administered with unusual severity but had managed to extend to 24. Her bottom had turned out to be, as hoped, a wonderful example of the pear-shaped variety, he had felt his performance with the cane was at its best, and the effects upon Anna's bottom had been gratifying indeed.

His problem however, was one of greed. The experience had been such an unusually splendid one that he had wanted more. Even though Priscilla was standing there, waiting her inevitable turn, the headmaster had been struck by a sudden fear that he would never again have the privilege of seeing, let alone caning, Anna's bottom. True, she was still standing there and he had no compunction about looking at her, naked except for the socks; and he would have another glimpse of her now well-marked bottom when he told her get dressed. But he knew well that this was her last year in the school and he suddenly feared that his caning had been so severe that it might have achieved its professed purpose -- to reform her so effectively that she would never return to his study. In this quandary, his answer, ironically, would have been to cane her even more severely.

He had been sure that those last six, extra-hard strokes, delivered in quick succession, would have induced her hands to abandon the table to protect her bottom. Her bottom had indeed bounced all over the place under the cane, but her hands had stayed glued to the table. A surprising disappointment. If he'd succeeded, of course, he'd have had to consult the nurse as to whether the bottom was in good enough shape to receive more caning, and she'd probably have told him a delay was necessary. But this would have been even better -- he'd have been able to inspect her bottom a week later and it certainly wouldn't have been fit for more caning yet. Maybe it would've justified at least two more visits after that . . . and he was always especially intrigued by caning again a bottom he had beaten very recently because the marks seemed almost to leap into view again . . . but he had failed. Even though he could now turn his attention to Priscilla, of whose bottom he had been dreaming all day (even the Almighty had granted him an ecstatic vision of it during morning chapel, like a Saint Theresa of the headmaster's office), he was not used to losing control and so he turned to Priscilla with a slight feeling of unease.

The trouble now was that even his feelings about Priscilla were also slightly troubled. It was his annoyance with that dratted Mr. Turner again. His irritation had led him to be hasty, and to declare too light a punishment for both Anna and Priscilla. Of course, increasing the number of strokes was comparatively easy, thanks to his skill with the cane . . . as he had shown with Anna, up to a point. He prided himself on his ability to modify procedure as it proceeded. But he could do this only within strict limits, partly because he was himself obsessed with control and partly because he knew the nurse would ask him to hold to the rules. Strokes could be as hard as he himself decided. Penalties were entirely appropriate. But the basic categories of crime and punishment still determined such factors as position and state of undress.

Twelve strokes, even of the very best, meant removing skirt and knickers and bending over with legs apart, grasping the ankles. This condition had considerable benefits, including the fullest exposure of intimacies between the thighs. But, when it came to admiring the shape of a bottom, the headmaster actually preferred the less severe and the more severe positions, bending over touching toes and bending over the table. In these positions a bottom retained more of its exquisite roundness. And he knew that Priscilla had a bottom that he wished in particular to admire. He could not require Priscilla to undress completely, nor could he have her bend over the table, unless she protested too violently. Perhaps that would be the solution. This still left some untidy ends in his plans, but he could think about them while she was removing her skirt and knickers.

***

"Miss Priscilla! You will kindly take yourself over to that corner, remove your shoes, cardigan, skirt and knickers ... you may place them on the chair where your foolish friend has put hers, ...and return to this spot for your caning."

Priscilla was still unable to think or move. The fact that the headmaster seemed to be taking so long between one statement and the next had contributed to her gathering confusion. "Miss Priscilla, perhaps it is because you have been heretofore unfamiliar with these situations, but you must wake up ... and wake up rather quickly ... to the fact that when you are here for a punishment you do exactly what you are told and do it immediately ... I will excuse you this one time, but you must now do as you are told ... IMMEDIATELY!"

This last, abruptly emphatic word finally triggered some response in Priscilla's brain and she began slowly to walk over to the corner where Anna's humiliation had started. When she reached it, she looked down at the little pile of Anna's clothes, seeming so small, abandoned and even dejected. Now she had to do as she was being ordered. She had to. Squatting down to undo her shoes was a comparatively easy start, but such a simple, everyday task suddenly seemed peculiarly awkward and ominous.

She pushed her shoes under the chair, with a deliberate neatness that struck even her as odd. Straightening up again, she undid the buttons on her cardigan, slowly shrugged it off and folded it neatly on top of Anna's more jumbled garments. Now, she realized, all too uncomfortably, there were no more harmless removals and her fingers went awkwardly to the clasp on her skirt. She felt the hook slip out of its loop and moved her fingers to the zipper. She flinched as the sound of its undoing, so slight, seemed to echo in the so quiet room. Remembering the way Anna's skirt had dropped so suddenly, she had meant to be more careful with her own, but her surprise at the unexpected sound of its zipper distracted her and she let it slip and fall to the floor, leaving her blouse hanging loosely around her hips. Embarrassment rose in her throat. It was not so much the feeling of her thighs uncovered ... that was not peculiar in itself ... the short skirts for hockey barely covered the thighs ... it was much more the knowledge of her skirt lying in an untidy circle around her feet that made her feel suddenly exposed.

Priscilla remembered Anna's disastrous pause in her undressing, and she knew she had to keep going. At least the headmaster hadn't ordered her to take off her top ... but removing her panties was worse than bad enough ... her hands went to the elastic of her panties ... they had to. She pushed down, feeling the waistband slipping over her hips and bottom ... she had to bend forward to push them further down, now feeling the elastic pull in below the undercurve of her bottom and then down her thighs. Almost sick with increasing embarrassment, she finally got her panties down around her ankles, lifted one foot, almost losing her balance as she did so, then the other foot. There they were, a tiny bundle of acutely embarrassing cloth in her hand. She dropped it helplessly on the pile of clothes and straightened up. But her skirt was still lying on the floor around her feet and she had to bend down to pick it up. Now that she'd taken her panties off, she was horribly aware of her complete nakedness below the waist as bent and straightened again to move her skirt from the floor to the chair. She bit her lips in helpless dismay and she could feel her heart beating. She felt the air of the room flowing around her hips and between her thighs, the slight coolness seeming to carry with it the eyes of the headmaster. She stared at her feet, toes in white socks, she had to do something but she couldn't even think what it was ...

"Miss Priscilla!" The headmaster's voice, cool yet menacing, like the air flowing around her private parts, told her that this nightmare was finally sucking her in to its center. "So, both of you can take yourselves all the way to the county fair ... yet both of you seem to paralyzed when it comes to the simple matter of walking from that corner to here, where your appropriate punishment is waiting." Swisher... swisher ...the sound of a swishing cane made Priscilla start ... "That's two extra strokes for you also ... and there'll be more unless you do exactly as you're told ... and come over here ... NOW!"

It was as though his words were needed at each moment, to propel Priscilla bit by bit to the place where she was too terrified to go. She turned towards him, still staring at the floor, knowing that her blouse came only part way down her tummy, and she knew also that he was looking at what was to be seen just below it.

He was waiting about 20 feet away, cane in hand. The short distance was enough for Priscilla's mind to start desperately seeking an escape, and her earlier fantasy with Anna began to take hold again. The ritual was for her now and now she knew what it was and she had to offer herself. The headmaster's voice seemed to have become that of an ancient priest ... her consciousness floating on it ... "Stand here, and face that way ..." She did, turning to face the table over which Anna had received her punishment. The silence seemed to go on for ever ... finally, "Now bend over, right over ... keep your legs straight and touch your toes."

Priscilla, like an automaton, bent over and both saw and felt her world turning upside down as she did so. She found herself looking at her own legs (with white socks), ... at the legs of furniture, at (so startlingly) Anna from the waist down, naked, ... at the trousered legs of the headmaster to her left. She stared at the floor which her fingers were touching. A carpet with all the details of its weave had never looked like this before. She heard the headmaster move and then felt her blouse being folded up on her back. Its front was hanging in front of her eyes and partly obscuring her view, upside down as it was. She felt utterly and completely helpless, knowing her bottom was sticking up, as naked as it was prominent. She had been somehow shut out from the world of which her own bared bottom had become the center. Suddenly, her mind summoned up the Callipygian maidens from the depth of its terror. Instead of shame, she began to feel that she was fulfilling the mysterious ideals of this ancient tale, her own bottom bared and offered ... she knew it was beautiful, that it would not be ashamed, she hoped that the headmaster would accept it ... as the most beautiful ... for whatever he wished .... A spontaneous and seemingly inexplicable impulse suddenly made her press her waist down, arching her back and thrusting her bottom up higher. Perhaps it was simply an urge to present her Callipygian bottom as prominently as possible. Perhaps it had something to do with the way she had just seen Anna presenting her bottom. She did not consciously think about it at all ... she just did it.

***

The headmaster had, in fact, had already his own Callipygian epiphany, and although it was a moment promising further ecstasy, it was also one of confusion.

As Priscilla's skirt had dropped from her hips, the first sight of her bottom swelling within the stretched whiteness of her panties had immediately confirmed his expectations. It was a perfect apple shape. He was also grateful that both she and Anna had chosen to wear panties. Neither he nor the girls had any idea how their ideas oddly coincided on this issue, but coincide they did. Even though so little time normally elapsed between the moments when girls dropped their skirts and then their underwear, he thought the sight of bottoms in panties much more gratifying than in standard blue knickers. He found it oddly satisfying to glimpse the shape of a bottom so clearly just a moment before it had to be fully exposed.

He was in fact grateful that Priscilla was proceeding so slowly because this particular revelation was one he had savored with such pleasure. But when she finally pulled down her panties and her bottom was fully bared, he was transported in a manner that even he had not contemplated. Suddenly, he realized that here indeed was the ideal bottom that had lain submerged deep in his subconscious ever since, as a student, he had first studied it. Then he had seen it only in marble, plaster, painting and drawing. Now, after so long and quite without warning, it was before him in the flesh.

He had, of course, always consciously contemplated and enjoyed the very large number of female bottoms that had been bared before him, and considered himself a deeply informed connoisseur of their qualities. On many happy occasions he had exclaimed to himself how gratifyingly attractive was a particular example. Anna's bottom had just provided such an occasion. But he had forgotten the origin of his pleasure and had long since ceased to think that his perfect bottom could actually exist. And it was his perfect bottom, its perfection determined as much by the peculiarities of his own mind as by nature. And here it was, presented by this young woman who was removing her clothes, on his orders, with such anguished slowness.

He knew that he desired to see Priscilla completely naked. But the rules could not be broken . . . and anyway, the sight of Priscilla with no clothes from her blouse down to her socks was already almost more than he could manage. Indeed, discomfort was rapidly increasing with his ecstasy, because he knew that he no longer had the total control upon which he depended. Priscilla was still standing in front of the chair and he would have been quite happy to let her stay there longer while he contemplated her bottom sticking out beneath the blouse, and tried to work out a plan. But he realized that both the nurse and Anna where also watching and probably wondering what he was up to, so he decided to use the "why are we waiting?" maneuver, to get himself and her to the next stage . . . and also to extent her punishment.

As a result, Priscilla was now walking towards him across the room. He was diverted briefly by trying to make the most of the glimpse of her pubis that her state of undress afforded and she had reached the appointed caning spot even before he could gather his wits. At this point it was easy to tell her to turn and face the left-hand wall. But this immediately left him with the problem of what position to have her adopt.

For a brief moment he toyed with the idea of getting rid of the nurse and Anna and finding out whether Priscilla would be prepared to display her bottom in whatever position he wished in exchange for being let off her caning, but this wild idea vanished immediately. In any case, he wouldn't really have been prepared to forgo the privilege of caning her.

Of course! He had already decided that he would start by having her bend over in the "touch-toes" position .. maybe even with her legs together. He was sure that her intimate parts were formed with a perfection as complete as that which characterized her bottom and he was most certainly not going to miss an opportunity to inspect them ... but perhaps he would deliberately delay such a delicious moment on this unique occasion ... later ..

"Bend over!" He tried to sound calm as he uttered the words at which he was so practiced but which still retained their ominous weight . . . and this time .. well! As he completed his instructions and Priscilla followed them, and as he folded back her blouse to expose as much of the line of her back as possible, he found himself confronting another psychological crisis. He was bewitched by what he saw. The perfect coordination of the widening of her hips and the swelling of her bottom, with exactly that sharpness and symmetry of curve that he most admired, soft yet firm and smooth. The swelling of the wonderfully rounded cheeks, full enough to press tightly together into the rapidly deepening cleft. The way in which the curving line of that central cleft perfectly echoed the outline of the cheeks on either side. The sharp line of the crease curving under each cheek, still visible in the skin even as she was bending over. The slight indentation in her cleft showing were her anus was still concealed between her cheeks. And the folds of flesh merging and disappearing into the still hidden depths between her thighs. When the headmaster had moved to fold her blouse up, he had managed to snatch a closer glimpse between her thighs and had been delighted to discover that she was a perfect example of that intimate female anatomy presented in the bend-over touch-toes position that he loved most of all, where a small hollow between the thighs opened an utterly delightful glimpse of the vulva lips in their deepest recess. Familiar as he was with such sights and practiced as he was in permitting himself to look without revealing any of the considerable desire they aroused, for a moment he thought he might lose control. He was possessed, to a degree he had never experienced before with any of the girls whose conduct had brought them to such a position, to fall on his knees in worship and press his face into that bewitching cleft.

As he moved back to the position in which he would administer the cane, his mind reeling, he was almost compelled to wipe his brow in case any sweat was showing. Never before had he felt so endangered. He diverted himself for a moment by observing how the drooping of the front Priscilla's blouse at least afforded him a glimpse of the white cupped underside of her breasts and the thought that, if the Almighty were kind, he might possibly bring Priscilla back on another occasion when complete undress might be in order ...

He was still contemplating these sights and wondering how to manage Priscilla's caning without disgracing himself, when she made an astonishing move. While remaining in the classic "touch-toes" position, she suddenly arched her back, rounding her bottom even more and thrusting it up further.

The headmaster may well have blinked in astonishment, though he tried desperately to look unmoved. In years gone by, he had actually tried to get girls to present themselves in this way, for it certainly made their bottoms into an even more attractive target. He had given up the attempt in one of the curiously considerate decisions that sometimes characterized him, for he had realized that it was actually rather difficult for girls to maintain this position. When they were bending over the table, of course, it was both easy and essential. Why Priscilla had suddenly put herself in this position, he had no idea. It was very gratifying yet also threatened his sense of control even more. It seemed almost like a command from Priscilla herself. He would have liked to find another excuse to look between her legs again, for the arched waist position certainly opened her cleft and thighs more widely, but he somehow felt that he was now obliged to begin the caning forthwith.

He was almost resentful, as though he were being hurried. In all canings, he felt the first stroke was of singular importance. Before it, there was a smoothly unmarked bottom, proffered for punishment indeed, but still unquestionably belonging to its owner. After the sound of the cane's first impact, the first cry of dismay and the appearance of the first welt, it was as though the bottom had been uncontestably claimed by the cane as its own territory, to be dealt with as the cane chose until the moment that it was ceremoniously restored to its owner by the command to "stand up and make yourself respectable!"

If the first stroke of any caning was in some ways the most important, then that was incomparably more so in this case. Of course, he was still in charge and this would still be the first stroke, but still, it was disturbing . . . .

He carefully shuffled his feet, turning himself slightly to the left and moving slightly to his right so as to have as good a view as possible, raised his cane and laid it across the crown of Priscilla's bottom.

***

Priscilla's mind had now entirely lost its normal habit of slipping off into fantasies. Even as she desperately tried to make it think of something else, it refused. She could think of nothing but the headmaster, whose feet were close to her left, of the cane, the thin length of which had for a moment dropped low enough for her to see it between the headmaster's legs and her own, and all she could feel was the terrifying vulnerability of her bottom ... sticking up behind her ... bare ... horribly alone, helplessly isolated even from herself. She felt a thin, cool line of pressure across the center of her cheeks ... and suddenly, in a small place of calm objectivity surviving in her mind, she realized that, in a moment, she would, indeed, know what it felt like to be caned ...

The room was utterly silent ...all but the headmaster were holding their breath ... for a moment that long, thin, length of cane stretching out from the headmaster's hand and lying across the crown of Priscilla's bottom, was not only the physical connection between the person who would cane and the person who would be caned, it also connected two strangely mirrored minds, one of a person who had never been caned, who knew that she did not know what the cane would feel like, and who was desperately fearful about what would happen when that imminent first stroke actually landed across her bottom; the other of a person who had administered countless strokes of the cane before but was now about to deliver a stroke across a bottom that he felt was different from all others he had ever caned, and who was hoping that this stroke would, also, somehow, be different from all the others.