All the boys without question kept their heads down, even to the point of avoiding eye contact with the teacher about to cane or who had just caned. Amongst the fifteen or so girls, half a dozen were wide eyed and keen for the show to commence, another half dozen were totally ambivalent to what was about to happen or had just happened. The rest were either scared themselves or had some sympathy for the boy across the desk.
Quite a few conversations turned to what was perceived as the over use of the cane during our school years, in fact the two women who organised the evening deliberatley didn’t invite any teachers who were still in the land of the living, as they didn’t want any unpleasantness because of punishments given to some of the boys years ago.