The final applicant

To complete the task started some considerable time ago, I am today finally at liberty to reveal the outcome of our deliberations regrading the vacant post of Head of House. You will recall that when the interviews took place, earlier this year, we invited each of the candidates to demonstrate their disciplinary prowess both by determining the punishment they considered to be most appropriate to a pre-supplied fictitious misdemeanour, and also by then executing their chosen punishment on the bare bottom of a senior girl selected for the purpose. Well, dear reader, it was a close-run thing. Although, on the basis of a rather lacklustre caning, it was possible to eliminate Candidate D at an early stage in our deliberations, the remaining three candidates each brought their own unique quality to the post, and I would have been happy to employ each one of them. Sadly, there is but one vacancy, and difficult decisions must be made. Candidate C, you may recall, was the only one of the four not to use a cane. Nevertheless, poor Charlotte Edward's bottom showed more than adequate signs of the severity of her punishment, so we duly kept her in the running. We all admired Candidate B's ingenuity in making an example of Miss Knowles'. You may recall that, after caning her (as Head Girl) for setting such a poor example to the juniors he then made her stand in the corridor for everyone to see. Such a shaming example would certainly have redressed any imbalance caused by such a serious misdemeanour, but the panel felt that total nudity in punishment was rather unnecessary, and we thus dismissed Candidate B from contention. Which left the first candidate we interviewed. He had the challenge of chastising not one, but two of our girls and both Katie and Rebecca were impressed by his accuracy. Although poor Rebecca - in her assumed role as the instigator of the inappropriate relationship with a younger girl - received rather too many strokes (a total of twelve) we nevertheless felt that this gentleman had the necessary skill and judgement we required.

We were thus left with the unenviable task of deciding between two extremely worthy candidates. As a woman, Candidate C was ideal in so many ways. But then Mr A , too, had so much to recommend him. I regret we could not separate the two candidates. We invited all three of the girls who had been disciplined by these candidates to give the panel the benefit of their opinion. But we found each of the girls arguing an intelligent case for the one who had punished them. Charlotte Edwards spoke very highly of Miss C's ability with the strap, and both Katie and Rebecca (now a little calmer) argued strongly that house discipline would be extremely secure in the hands of Candidate 'A'. Thus stuck on the horns of a dilemma, we decided there was only one thing for it. Both candidates would be invited back for a 'spank off'. This time, there will be none of the added pretence of role-play. Indeed, we will allow neither candidate the luxury either of choosing an implement, or determining the appropriate punishment. I will reconvene the interview panel, select two girls from the upper sixth, and invite each candidate in turn to cane the girls in front of us. That should settle the matter properly. Now, any volunteers?