My best friend at this stage of my life was a boy - in my form at school, but two years older than me - named William Connolly. William and I had been very close friends for some years at this stage, and it had become quite common for me to spend my school holidays with his family. The Connollys were extremely wealthy, so didn't need to worry about the cost of taking in another boy, and they treated me extremely well while I was in their care. Almost as if I was one of their own children - as close to treating me in that way as I think anyone reasonably could. And I saw them almost as a family.

Mr and Mrs Connolly weren't quite parents to me - but a close Uncle and Aunt would probably fairly describe the relationship. Mr Connolly was a highly successful man, often very busy, but still quite involved in his childrens' lives considering the social norms of our class at the time. Mrs Connolly was fairly typical of the wife of such a man. She didn't work, but was involved with quite a lot of charity work, and social activities. Both of them were very kind. But both of them were also quite strict. Nothing unusual in that time or place. If a child misbehaved, they were punished as a matter of course. And punishments tended to be physical ones. Normally Mr Connolly punished his children, but Mrs Connolly certainly did so on occasion as well - and when I was in their care, I was treated just as they treated their own children.

The children - the Connollys had five children.

The eldest was Lucy, about 19 years old and a university student at the time of this account. She was well and truly stuck between the world of the child and the world of the adult at this stage of her life - the age of majority in our state was still 21 at this stage, but it had changed to 18 in some other states and that reflected the general confusion that was going on across the country. Lucy saw herself as an adult, I think. Her parents and most other adults, however, did not. This tended to create a situation where Lucy was able to order her younger siblings (and me) around and we were expected to obey her as long as she wasn't unreasonable. But she was still very much subject to her parents' control. When I'd been a little younger, Lucy had been the first girl I had a crush on - but once she'd gone to university, things had changed. I did see her as very grown up and rather out of my league, and by the time of this account I saw her more as a big sister figure than anything else. And I think she saw me in the reciprocal of that understanding - as a rather irritating brother-like creature.

After Lucy, came William - 17 years old - my best friend, and yes, very close to a brother in soul and spirit, if not in fact. I saw myself as his equal - almost - I was aware he was two years older than me - but he was aware that in our school lives, I had been placed above him. Sometimes I was the leader. Sometimes he was.

Then came Amelia. Amelia was my age - 15 - although she was in a normal class for her age and so had at least two more years of schooling ahead of her. Again, I saw Amelia as a sister figure - mostly. Over the course of the previous year or so, I had noticed that my feelings for her had changed a bit. She was at our sister school, which we got together with for dances and other formal social activities and she was generally my partner at these events. We didn't see ourselves as boyfriend and girlfriend - but I think only because in our social environment, children of 15 were strongly discouraged from thinking in those terms. It was something for later on and we understood the way that worked. Nonetheless, I was quite close to Amelia in a few different ways.

These three were the 'big kids' of the family. All three were away at boarding school most of the year. They had two younger siblings as well - Susan who would have been 12 at this time, I think, and Terrence who was about 10. These two were educated by a governess, although Susan was due to start school at the beginning of the next year. I liked these two little kids well enough, but didn't really know them as well

The governess, Miss Burke, was also really part of the family - technically she was governess only to the two youngest children (I believe she had been to Amelia as well, but that was before I knew her). Unofficially, however, she tended to take charge of any child (and to her that meant anyone under 21) in her immediate vicinity. She was a very nice lady, but also a very proper one, who had very firm ideas on proper behaviour herself.

Right at the end of our school year - a week or so before the holidays began and I finished my schooling, Amelia had become very sick, very suddenly. I've described the events surrounding that occasion in an account entitled Matriculation - but they are of direct relevance to this account so I will recap them briefly.

The Connollys were in Europe on a business holiday. Their older children were all at school or university, the younger children were still at the family home in the care of Miss Burke. So when Amelia got sick, her parents were thousands of miles away. William wanted to go to his sister's side but was forbidden from doing so, as she was in quarantine - they didn't know what was wrong with her. He decided he was going anyway and with the help of money I gave him, snuck away from school in the middle of the night. He was caught by Miss Burke who had also gone to see Amelia, and was returned to school where he was very severely punished for 'running away'. Amelia, thank God, recovered rapidly from her illness - it was some sort of allergic reaction, the details of which I don't know (when we got to see her, we tried asking, but she wouldn't tell us, and Lucy and Miss Burke threatened us until we stopped asking).

In any event, Amelia recovered rapidly that her parents decided to remain in Europe. All the children (and I was invited as well) were to fly to London to meet up with their parents when school finished anyway - so coming back would have meant a long plane trip, for a couple of days with Amelia, and then immediately flying back - and she was fine. She was discharged from hospital less than a day and a half after we'd been told she might be dying. As I understand it, she was recovered by the time the Connollys had even been told she was sick.

So on the day after school had ended, we began our epic trip to London - well, that's how it seemed to me at the time anyway. Miss Burke took responsibility for getting us all there, and her manner towards me was rather cooler than normal. She'd been quite angry with William for his unauthorized absence from school, and at me for assisting him. William however had been severely punished for what he'd done. I had escaped with no real punishment at all. I think she was annoyed at that.

So while she told both William and myself that she was going to tell Mr Connolly precisely what had happened when we got to London, and she implied that we were both going to be in serious trouble when she did, her manner towards William was much more friendly than her manner towards me. I don't want to suggest she was being mean or nasty - far from it - but there was enough frostiness in her attitude to make me very uncomfortable on our long trip to London. I knew Miss Burke liked me - and yet, she was obviously very upset with me. I knew the Connollys liked me as well - and Miss Burke's attitude left me wondering what type of reception I would get from them.

It wasn't a nice feeling.

The Connolly's gave me a great deal of love and affection - but always, always, at the back of my mind, I was aware that I wasn't automatically entitled to such. I'm sure William was somewhat apprehensive about what his parents would do when we got to London - but at least he had absolutely no fear of them withdrawing their love and affection for him. They were his parents, whatever he did.

I didn't have that. And at my core as we flew to London, I really worried that I might have disappointed them so much that I would lose the relationship I had with them - a relationship that was as close to parental as any I had. And it was a long trip to London. As we traveled I got more and more nervous. Nervous enough in fact that if there had been any practical means of escape I might have taken it and tried to get back to Australia under my own steam.

We arrived in London quite late in the afternoon as I recall and immediately I was somewhat reassured by Mr and Mrs Connollys' reaction to me. They were as warm and friendly as ever, and believe me, that was an incredible relief. We took taxis to where we were to stay in London - I should probably describe the living arrangements in a little detail as they are somewhat relevant to this account.

The Connollys had taken over two houses in London's Belgravia. Both were fairly small by the standards they were used to, but it was (and I believe still is) an expensive place to live. One of our near neighbours was, Lord Lucan, apparently. The arrangement was that Mr and Mrs Connolly and the two younger children (along with Miss Burke) were living in the larger two houses, while Lucy, William, Amelia and I were around the corner in the smaller house. Lucy was nominally in charge of us - and wasn't too impressed by this, as I recall, as it meant she wasn't as free to do what she wanted as she would have liked. Probably very clever on the Connolly's part - she was hardly likely to complain about being given such an adult responsibility but it did quite effectively limit her freedom.

Anyway - this first afternoon and evening was spent at the larger house where we all had a meal together and the Connolly's got to grips with their children again. It was a wonderful evening in my memory - as I say, they treated me very much as if I was their son, myself, and such memories are very precious.

After the meal, though, things changed a little bit. Mr Connolly approached William and myself and quietly informed us of the need to have a serious discussion about certain things he had been told about our behaviour. He gave us a choice - we could deal with it that evening, or see him in the morning. We decided we'd rather deal with it now than wait overnight. We both had school reports as well, of course, and he decided that he'd better digest those as well before our discussion. So he asked to see us in an hours time. I was unconcerned about my school report - my marks were very close to perfect - but William had some rather serious concerns in that regard.

Midway through the year, William had decided that he was going to do a second Sixth Form year. This wasn't at all uncommon -  a significant minority of boys made that decision for various reasons. In his case, it was because he had decided to try for Oxford - his father had gone to university there - and the extra year of dedicated preparation would be a great help to him in doing that. The thing is, though, that having made that decision, William had allowed his schoolwork to taper off a bit for the rest of the year. His marks weren't bad marks - but they were considerably less than his father knew he was capable of (and it was probably a little unfair that his father was seeing William's marks next to mine). Even worse, our Masters and Mistresses have descriptions about how hard we'd worked in their subject - Mr Connolly was used to seeing 'Goods' or 'Excellents'. The occasional 'Fair' was all right, but William had mostly 'Fairs' and at least one 'Poor'. This was not going to be acceptable to his father.

We sat around and waited for the hour to pass. Our waiting wasn't helped by the girls - Lucy was acting very grownup and expounding on how we were going to get what we deserved, Amelia was happy that her recent illness seemed to have given her a get-out-of-gaol free card (she was wrong about that, as it turned out, but she believed it at the time). As the deadline approached, William and I got up and decided to prepare ourselves. This involved using the toilet and making ourselves look as presentable as possible - probably not that important, but you played every card you had. We were both apprehensive, because we knew we were very likely to be punished, but we were resigned to it and used to it. We weren't in a panic or anything, After we'd finished in the toilet, we headed to Mr Connolly's study. As we approached, William put a hand on my arm.

"I'll go first, Nat - if needed."

This was a bit of a surprise. It was understood (whether correctly or not) that when two or more people were being physically punished, it was far better to be the first person punished. There was some debate on this point, but that was the generally accepted situation. William and I had been punished together on numerous occasions, and he generally let me go first in those cases (if we had a choice - we didn't always) as I was younger. So his wanting to go first was a surprise. I was willing to go along with it, but he saw that I was surprised so he explained.

"I'm still pretty marked. When Dad sees, he might go easier on me. And if he goes easier on me first, he might feel he needs to go easier on you to be fair. Worth a try?"

I readily agreed to this logic.

We arrived at the door.

"Chin up, thumbs up."

"Chin up, thumbs up."

William knocked.

"Come in."

The study was quite small. A desk, a chair behind it, and a few armchairs. He was sitting in one, and he gestured to William and myself to sit in other chairs. Then he began to speak.

"I'm not going to beat around the bush, boys. I'm rather disappointed in the pair of you. William." He picked up the school report. "These marks are unacceptable. Now, they're not disastrous, but they're just not good enough. And you could have done better, couldn't you?"

"Yes, Sir."

"This bill is also very concerning to me. How in God's name were you able to ruin three jackets this year?"

I knew the answer. William had managed to more or less destroy three blazers at school that year. Our blazers were quite expensive, and were the one item of our school clothing we had to keep in near pristine condition. You could get away with damaging trousers or a shirt (as long as your House Captain was willing to cover up for you, which was the case for William) as you had multiples of those and a friend would lend you theirs in a pinch. But we only had one blazer each and by sixth form, most boys had embroidery on their blazer pockets outlining their achievements at the school, so you couldn't wear someone elses. William had destroyed his first blazer playing in an impromptu game of rugby one afternoon. This wasn't a major disaster - his blazer was a couple of years old at this point, and this was the straw that broke the camels back - it would have needed replacing soon enough anyway. But the second was destroyed after only two weeks, courtesy of an ink filled water pistol (I'd wound up having to cane William over that - not fun, but better than our only alternative of sending him to the House Master). The last blazer had lasted into third term, when he managed to almost tear the arm off it, climbing under a barbed wire fence. Each time he had been sent into town to get a new blazer, and each time it had been added to a bill for his parents.

The Connollys were wealthy - seriously wealthy - but nonetheless, William was expected to be careful with his possessions. And he hadn't been.

"I was careless, Sir. I've no excuse for the blazers - no real excuse anyway. Well, except for the first one. That was on its last legs and all I did was put it out of its misery a month or so earlier."

"Hmm... well, wantonly destroying two blazers rather than three isn't much improvement. And then there is this matter of you running off to the city last week. Now I know you were worried about Amelia, and we can make some allowances for that - but it's really not on. Anything could have happened, running off like that in the middle of the night. It's a good thing we didn't know what was happening because the last thing your mother would have needed was having to worry about two of her children." He paused and said more quietly. "Last thing I would have needed to."

"Sir." I spoke up. "William's been punished for that already - and badly punished. I don't think he needs more for that." William couldn't say it. I could.

"I'm aware that William has been punished for that - but you haven't been have you. You helped him, didn't you?"

"Yes, Sir. I did." I saw no reason to hide it - and I was resolved to be honest with this man, at this point, whatever the cost to me might have been.

"You had a duty to stop him."

"Yes, Sir. No, Sir. I don't know, Sir. It was a confused situation..."

"I can believe that - but if you didn't know, you should have taken the guidance of your Headmaster - and you did not, did you?"

"No, Sir."

"No, you did not. I can understand you not knowing what was best, Nathan. But you didn't have to make that decision alone. You took it, knowing it was in defiance of the Headmaster."

"Yes, Sir. I did."

"So I think you deserve punishment? Don't you?"

"The Headmaster let me off..."

Mr Connolly's voice became quite cold. "The Headmaster let you off because he couldn't punish you in the way you deserved, without having to punish you in a way you did not deserve. Isn't that the case?"

It was. The only real reason I had escaped the flogging that William received was that the Headmaster would have just about had to strip me of my House Captaincy if I had been flogged as well. I deserved the former, but he judged that I did not deserve the latter - and I think he was right to do so.

"Yes, Sir."

"Well, I am under no such constraint." His voice warmed again, "You were part of William's misadventure - and yes, he already paid a fair price for that particular misdemeanour. You haven't - and I think you ought to. Do you really disagree?"

"No, Sir."

"Right then. Let's put this unpleasant episode behind us as quickly as possible."

William sprang up stepped forward. His father raised an eyebrow at that - he knew as well as we both did how these things worked - but as I raised no type of objection by word or action, he accepted matters.

"Drop your trousers, and your underpants, and bend over my lap."

This had always been Mr Connolly's way of punishing his children (and myself while I was in his care). An old fashioned spanking. Stroke for stroke, it was nothing like as bad as a caning - but the difference was that unlike a caning that was quite limited in time, a spanking from him could go on seemingly indefinitely.

William did look a little odd, with his pants down bent across his fathers knee - he was at least as tall as his father, maybe even a little taller, though still smaller in build. His hands were planted flat on the ground, his legs were bent. His white bottom was still marked by the severe caning he'd received a little over a week earlier, but Mr Connolly showed no real signs that he even noticed. He simply raised his hand, and brought it down hard on one cheek and then the other. He spanked quite rapidly and quite hard. After only three or four spanks, William's bottom was starting to redden. After a dozen, William started to gasp and after twice that number, he was grunting in pain. He began crying at about thirty spanks, and was in full flow when his father passed the fifty mark. At that point I stopped even trying to count. I didn't really want to know what I might be facing. I was scared.

But even worse, I realized I had developed an erection. And this was quite shocking to me. It had happened when I had been forced to watch William flogged the previous week and that had been bad enough. But in this case, I realized that in a minute or so, I was going to have to lower my trousers and underpants in front of Mr Connolly in that condition - William didn't really worry me that much, he'd seen that before. But I really didn't want Mr Connolly to see that.

I tried to will it away but it didn't work. The spanking continued and I began to panic a bit. When Mr Connolly finally finished with William - at a guess, after something like one hundred spanks, and let him stand up, I was in a really nervous state.

"Nathan, come here."

I couldn't move. I was torn. I didn't want to seem like a wimp who couldn't take a spanking - and besides, I was sure that if needed, Mr Connolly would drag me to where he wanted me - but I couldn't stand the thought of dropping my trousers so he could see my shame. I was still sitting in the armchair and bent over a bit trying to cover up any sign through my trousers.

"Nathan. Here!"

"Please, Sir..."

"No - come here or it will be worse for you."

"I need to go to the toilet, Sir."

"Oh... you should have gone before you came." William, his face tearstreaked looked up from where he had just pulled up his trousers with a somewhat puzzled expression on his face. He knew that I had gone less than ten minutes earlier. But his father accepted my statement. "Be back quickly."

I bolted out the door and headed to the toilet. Amelia was just outside the study door, but I barely noticed her. As soon as I was in the toilet, I set to work getting rid of the erection in the quickest way I knew how. It only took a minute. Then I walked back. There was now no sign of Amelia.

I entered the study and walked straight to position next to Mr Connolly's side as quickly as I could. I wanted this over - but I also wanted to remove doubts he might have had about my courage arising from my actions a couple of minutes earlier. Without being asked I lowered my trousers and underpants and bent across his knee. The first spank came within a second of me arriving in position. I managed to hold out for perhaps a dozen before I started making any noise. And then I lost all sense of pride and started gasping and then crying. The spanking went on and on. It wasn't as bad as a caning in intensity but it was immensely worse in duration. It was relentless. And long before it was finished I was entirely repentant for every offence I had ever committed.

And then it was over. Mr Connolly allowed me to stand up and pull up my trousers. He gave me a minute to recover some of my composure and then he addressed us.

"I hope that had the desired effect. I'm sure you're both hurting." He winced. "And perhaps it might come as some consolation to you both that I think I've pulled a muscle in my shoulder." No. No consolation at all, actually. "I beg to hope that given your age, William, that this might not be necessary again - but rest assured that if punishment is needed, you will receive it." He was swinging his arm backwards and forwards and grimacing. "The same goes for you as well, Nathan - while you're my responsibility, I will certainly punish you if you deserve it. For now though, it's over. Head over to the other house. I will see you both at breakfast."

We left the study, and then the house to walk around the corner to where we were to sleep. As soon as we were outside, William asked the obvious question.

"What do you mean you had to use the toilet? You went just before, I know you did."

At school, the idea that someone might be aroused by corporal punishment was the subject of jokes at times. And it was seen as rather horrible and disgusting. I considered covering up - but the only other explanation I could offer was one of cowardice and that seemed worse. And I felt very confused. I didn't really know why I'd developed an erection. Anyway, I gave a truthful answer.

"I got a stiffy."

"Oh, is that all? I suppose it might have been embarrassing - especially as Amelia was watching. But..."

"HANG ON! Amelia was watching?"

"Yep. I don't know if she watched me - I hope not, that would be quite sickening. But she was hiding round the corner. Dad couldn't see her - but I could see her reflected in the glass door on the bar.

"Oh hell."

"Don't worry. I doubt she saw much."

I was embarrassed - but not particularly outraged. I'd spied on her during a spanking myself a year or so earlier, so it was hardly something I could complain about. But I was very glad I'd taken action to reduce my state of arousal - that really could have been very embarrassing indeed.

We arrived at the other house and went inside - and pretty soon after went to bed. I heard Amelia and Lucy both come in about an hour later. They were arguing but quietly enough that I couldn't hear the content - and I didn't really think much of it - at the time.

As I expected, based on our previous disciplinary encounters, when we all met for breakfast the following day, the unpleasantness of the previous night almost totally forgotten. The Connollys punished misbehaviour and then we all moved on. That was how it worked. But there was one mention of what had happened after breakfast. Mr and Mrs Connolly asked us older children to wait after the meal was over. Miss Burke took the two youngest away.

Mrs Connolly began. "All right, we need to make some rules clear. You're in the other house so we can't be watching you all the time, and we shouldn't need to. We don't expect you to spend all your time in the house - you're old enough, and we hope responsible enough, to be allowed considerable latitude. But we will be eating every evening at seven, and you are expected to be here for that and to go straight back to the other house straight after. We also expect you to be here at breakfast at eight each morning - and obviously we expect you to be home between those times as well. Besides that you can do what you like - but leave a note in the lounge telling us where you are going and make sure you carry change for the phone, and money for a taxi."

"Lucy - you can go out at night, but you must tell us where you are going and what time you expect to be home, and if you are going to insist on going out on a date - or anything that might conceivably be seen as a date - with any boys you meet, we want to meet them first." Mr Connolly had now started setting his rules. "I promise not to embarrass you, and unless the boy is completely awful, I won't stop you going out with him - but I do want to meet him. And we do need to know when you won't be there. You other three - we may possibly allow you out at night - but that will be decided entirely on a case by case basis. Is all this clear?"

We answered in the affirmative - it was clear, and seemed (to me at least) entirely reasonable. We were allowed to go where we liked in the daytime. We had to be home for meals together and at night.

"Very well then - you may go. Except for you, Amelia. We need to discuss a few things."

"Like what?"

"You probably don't want the others to hear."

"Oh."

We trooped out. Amelia looked miserable as we went. We returned to the other house, to get ready for the outing we had planned for that day - we'd decided that for this first day of our holiday we were going to go out together and visit a few of the classic sights of London. But we had intended for Amelia to accompany us.

Lucy was fully in "I'm in charge because I'm the eldest" mode. She forced me to return to my room to get a warmer jacket and I complied. She told William he needed to shave and he obeyed. She tried to convince both of us we should be wearing ties and we told her where to get off - we had to dress neatly (we didn't have any choice - Mrs Connolly had chosen all our clothing except our school uniforms and she believed in neatness) but we really did feel it was a bit much to expect us to wear ties while we were on holidays. After Lucy accepted that we were not going to move on this point (and realized if she kept pushing, we might not give way on anything else either), she announced that we were going to wait for Amelia.

"Should we?" William asked - I was quite happy to wait. "She's obviously in trouble and you know what she's like if she gets a good spanking - she's useless for hours."

This was true. William and I were both very used to corporal punishment and able to... not exactly shrug it off, but it rapidly faded into the background. A caning might affect us for an hour, Mr Connolly's spankings, perhaps half as long - but then we were fine, if a little tender. Lucy was less experienced than us and less resilient, but even for her, it didn't take that much longer. Amelia tended to fall to pieces when she was spanked. The rest of us might cry - she'd scream and shriek. She'd fight what was happening. And she was generally a wreck afterwards for hours.

"She might be OK," replied Lucy. "She's not in that much trouble and I think Dad might go easy on her. Honestly, I thought he was going to let her off. He almost said so last night. I think Mum has convinced him that's not good form - but I doubt he'll go hard on her."

"What did she do?"

"It's her school report. She managed to pass everything, but only by the skin of her teeth. She obviously didn't work hard this year - and it's starting to matter."

William spoke up. "Well, I hope he doesn't go easy on her, then! That was mostly why he got me so hard last night and there's got to be some consistency. He didn't go easy on me!"

Lucy looked puzzled. "I thought he whacked you for running away?"

"No - he said that was dealt with. He didn't like my marks. Don't blame him either, to be honest - they weren't very good. But if he goes easy on her, there's no justice."

"Well," said Lucy, rising to her feet. "Then maybe we should go before she gets back. Because he won't go easy on her if he went hard on you for the same thing - and I'd really rather not deal with her if she's in a state. Especially not after last night?"

"What happened last night?" I was curious. Their quarrel had kept me awake - it had been loud enough to be annoying, but not loud enough for me to hear.

"Nothing - nothing you need to know about."

"We heard you fighting," said William.

"Yes, well... we do that sometimes. We're sisters."

"But what was it about?"

Lucy looked at us. "You probably have a right to know, actually. She was hiding outside Dad's study while he spanked you. She heard everything. I don't think that's on."

"She wasn't just listening, she was watching..." I wished I hadn't said that the instant it slipped out.

"What?" Lucy looked aghast. "I didn't know that. I should tell Dad, that really-"

"Oh, don't do that! Please, Lucy." I was agitated. "You can't do that. You can't dob her in."

"It's not right. She shouldn't do things like that! I've got to tell Dad, it just isn't on at all."

"Please. I've done the same to her. So it's all square."

"Oh. I see." She paused. "Well... in that case, I won't tell. Not unless you do something to make me tell. You never do that again - and I'll tell her as well."

"Sure. Not a problem, I swear I won't."

And at that point, we heard the front door open. And Amelia came in. Her face was red, but she was fairly composed. William glared at her.

"You got off."

"Not quite. Dad started, but he stopped after three - he hurt himself! Rather ironic!"

"He hurt himself?" Lucy looked a little worry.

"His shoulder - nothing deadly or anything, but he swore a lot."

I had never heard Mr Connolly swear that I can recall. And for him to swear in front of his daughter - he must have really been in quite considerable pain.

"So what happened?"

"He called Mum and told me to go. I got out of there before Mum decided she needed to finish what he'd started. Can we go now?" Amelia seemed quite eager to get moving.

"All right - get a warm coat, and we're off. Got the maps, Nathan? We don't want to get lost in the wilds of London?"

We left - and we had a great day - once we were out in the city, Lucy loosened up and stopped trying to be an adult. She was just another kid - and we were free in London. We visited a few different places and I reveled in the experience of having something like siblings, and being part of something like a family, as I always did when with the Connollys.

We made it back to Belgravia with about ten minutes to spare before dinner. Cut if rather fine.

Mr Connolly was wearing a sling. After we had started eating, Amelia rather hesitantly asked him if he was all right.

"It's just a muscle strain. I should be all right in a few days."

"Ah... what happens because I was..." she didn't seem to want to finish the sentence.

"Hmm. Well - I suppose it might be a little unfair if we resume things at this point - but on the other hand, I did punish William quite severely for the same thing and it might not be fair to him..."

"Fair go, Dad." William spoke with his mouth full, saw the expression on his mothers face, stopped, chewed and swallowed. "You can't start on her again - that just wouldn't be fair."

"You don't mind?" Mr Connolly smiled at his son.

"Well, yes, I do mind a bit, actually. But I'll live. There's fair and there's fair. And it'd be more unfair to start again on her, than it'd be unfair to me not to."

"Very well, then. But how about being fair to me?" Mr Connolly's tone was jovial. "You three - you, Nathan, and Amelia - you've broken me. Your behaviour has incapacitated me at the start of my first proper holiday in about five years."

"Sorry, Sir," I spoke at this point. "But if it's any consolation, we won't object if you feel it's necessary never to put yourself at risk of such injury again."

"Oh, don't you worry yourself, Nathan. I'm sure I will manage if necessary."

The Connolly family was like that. They could - we could - joke about such things. Not because they weren't serious, because they were - but because they existed in a certain context. When we misbehaved, our punishments were a serious business, make no mistake about that - but being serious, didn't necessarily mean being somber. This was just a part of life. Children misbehaved. Children were punished. Life moved on until the next time. There was no malice, there was no lasting rancour. When tension caused by misbehaviour was created, it was rapidly sliced away. And so it was on this occasion. We'd done the wrong thing - we'd paid the price (well, two of us had - and one of us had escaped, but that was all right as long as it didn't happen too often), and we moved past it.

But on this occasion, things did change a little - though it didn't become apparent for about another week - just before Christmas in fact.

It was a wet day. Very wet. And we'd all decided not to go out. We'd been asked our plans at breakfast, and we'd said we were going to stay in, so Mr and Mrs Connolly were aware of this fact.

I was up in my room reading when, somewhere in the middle of the morning I heard the front door open. Then I heard Mr Connolly's voice.

"Children - can you all come down here, please?"

I responded to the call. We all did, pretty rapidly. Because it was only a couple of days before Christmas, I anticipated the possibility of some treat.

My heart dropped as I entered the front room. Mr and Mrs Connolly were there - and in Mr Connolly's hand was a cane.

It was a little shorter than the canes used at school. It was slightly darker in colour and had two blue bands of tape on it - one near the crooked handle, one near the tip. It was quite scary looking - any cane is, when you are fifteen years old, I suppose. The others had all seen it as well - and we stood in a rough line in the doorway, while Mr and Mrs Connolly stood near the fireplace.

"Don't worry. None of you are in any trouble at the moment. But I was talking to one of the neighbours and I mentioned how I had hurt my shoulder. And she made a few suggestions. This is the result." He raised it up so we could see it more clearly. "It was surprisingly cheap to purchase, actually. I probably should have brought one a few years ago. I just wanted to let you know about it, so it doesn't come as a nasty surprise. I'm assured that it is very nasty - and that it stings most dreadfully. Let us hope that we don't have a need to test that out. You know I don't like wasting money - but let me just say that in this case, nothing would give me greater pleasure than to find out I have wasted the money I've spent on this. Don't feel you need to ensure I get value out of the purchase. Please."

William and I had been shocked - at least I assume his feelings were much the same as mine - but recovered equilibrium quickly enough. We were used to the cane - although I hadn't been caned in well over a year at this time. Amelia and Lucy though looked quite horrified and awe struck - I believe the cane was officially available at the girls' school Lucy had attended and Amelia was attending, but if so, it was used extremely rarely and I doubt either of them had received it - in fact I am certain Amelia hadn't. Amelia was a coward about physical punishment - saying that isn't a criticism, it's just a reflection of the way she reacted to it - and Lucy was 19 and saw herself as grownup. Being confronted by a cane had horrified the pair of them.

"Daddy... Father... Sir... Surely I'm too old for anything like that..."

Mrs Connolly answered. "That, my dear, is entirely up to you. If you are too old for the cane, then you won't do anything to deserve it, will you?"

"Well..."

Mr Connolly had placed the cane on the mantelpiece above the fireplace. "Lucy, you're still our daughter and I don't care how old you think you are, I know how old you really are. I am not saying that I will cane you if you do something wrong - but I am not going to say I won't, either. If the situation arises, we'll discuss it then - and I promise you I will listen to whatever you have to say before I make a decision. I believe that is fair. Do you?"

"I suppose so."

Mrs Connolly spoke. "Good. Now, we didn't just come over to scare you half to death - there's a pantomime this afternoon - I don't think you can be in England at Christmas without seeing a panto - so unless some of you think you're too old for such things, be ready after lunch."

They left - leaving the cane on the mantelpiece. I went over and picked it up - my time as a House Captain at school meant I had considerable experience of handling a cane, and I felt its balance, flexed it a bit to see how it bent, and slashed it through the air. Amelia watched with a pale white face as I did so.

"Is it a really hurting one?"

"I've never encountered one that isn't - but yes, I'd say this would hurt well enough." My tone must have seemed rather blasé.

"Don't you care?"

"Yes, I care! I'm just stating facts though. It's a good cane. It'll really hurt when someone gets it."

Lucy had come over as well. "You mean, if someone gets it."

I looked at the cane. I knew what I meant. I just had a very strong feeling. I knew myself - and I knew the others. "When."

Christmas came and went without incident - at least without any incident of interest to the people reading this account. It was one of the happiest times of my life, though - being in a family, everything stretching out before me. I was in heaven. The cane sat on the mantelpiece - we didn't dare to move it, even though we hadn't strictly been told we shouldn't. We did cover it with Christmas cards - or rather placed them in front of it - so it wasn't very visible. We didn't want it to be visible - there were some other kids our age living in the area (generally on Christmas holidays from school or university - much briefer than our holidays based on the Australian season) and they came visiting sometimes - boys who were interested in Lucy or Amelia, mostly, although occasionally there were girls with their eyes on William or myself. We really didn't want them seeing the cane - although they were generally of backgrounds and experiences that I suspect wouldn't have thought much of it - in fact, I'm sure it must have been one or other of their parents who told Mr Connolly where to buy such an instrument. So we hid it, just so it wasn't obvious. And tried to forget about it.

I did see both Lucy and Amelia examining it at times with odd expressions on their faces - Lucy looked nervous, Amelia tended to look rather scared of it. Then the new year came, we moved into January.

Lucy had met a few boys. And she was allowed to go out with at least one of them named Geoffrey - he was about twenty, quite nice - he insisted on giving William and I money when he saw us - I think he was trying to impress us with how flush he was. He also made a reasonable impression on Mr and Mrs Conolly - and he had dinner with us a couple of times. He took Lucy out two or three times a week, always with her parents express permission - William was left nominally in charge of us on those occasions.

About a week into January - or a week and a half - William traveled to Oxford to see the place. He was going to be gone for two days and a night. The evening he was gone, Mr and Mrs Connolly went out to a dinner party - a very formal do. It was about 7.30pm when there was a knock at our door. It was Geoffrey.

Lucy wanted Amelia and I to head up to bed so they could have some privacy. Naturally we chose to remain downstairs. She didn't like it - but her authority over us was limited to what we would give her, and she knew when it wasn't prudent to push it.

Geoffrey wanted to take Lucy out. He'd done this once before - just dropped in and they'd walked around to the other house and her parents had given permission. But this time they weren't there. And Lucy obviously wanted to go. She was torn between going out with Geoffrey - and her feelings of responsibility.

I told her to go.

"Oh go on, Lucy - you know your Dad would give permission if he was home."

"Yes, I know - but he's not. And I can't just leave you two."

"We're not infants, Lucy. We can look after ourselves. Go." Amelia supported my idea. "And he doesn't need to know, anyway. We'll cover for you."

She let herself be persuaded and left with Geoffrey. She was on thin ice - she had to know that that the argument "You would have said 'yes'" probably wasn't likely to be all that effective with her father if she was caught. But she also knew she wasn't likely to be caught. So she went.

But - and we did not know this until later - as they headed to Geoffrey's car, she got cold feet. Instead of going straight off with him, she went around the corner to the other house and spoke to Miss Burke. Actually a very sensible thing for her to do - Miss Burke strictly couldn't give her the permission she needed - but she was a trusted adult, and she agreed to look in on Amelia and myself later and pretty well told Lucy she could go - Mr Connolly might not have liked this arrangement that much to be honest - but it wasn't something he was likely to react that badly to either.

But we didn't know this. As far as Amelia and I knew, we were now unsupervised for the evening - Lucy generally got back about midnight or one o'clock - and we could do what we liked.

And there was this club that some boys who had come around one day had told us about. It was a music place, coffee shop type of place, where underage people were allowed to go. We'd asked Mr Connolly for permission to go there and he'd said he needed to find out a bit more about it first - and he hadn't yet.

Amelia suggested we go there.

Now, I could say that I only went with her because I knew she'd made up her mind to go, and there was no way I was going to let a fifteen year old girl wander around a strange city at night unescorted. And - well, I would have gone for that reason even if I hadn't wanted to go. But the honest fact is, I wanted to go myself.

And with a teenage boys sense of logic I reasoned that it was sort of all right for me to go because even though I wanted to I would have gone just to keep her safe and she was going anyway so I had to go to protect her and that meant it was all right for me to go because even though I wanted to go the real reason I was going was because it was the right thing to do even though I knew I was doing something I should not be doing and I was going because I enjoyed it.

(Did that make sense? It did when I was fifteen.)

So I agreed to go with her. We dressed up (Mrs Connolly had asked Lucy to pick clothes for William and myself as Christmas presents and so I actually had some rather nice gear now - this was my first chance to wear it) and headed down to the nearest tube station. The coffee shop was located near Earl's Court Station - only a short trip from where we were living. We got there without incident, around eight o'clock and went in. It was a nice enough place - not quite a night club, but it had good music and drinkable coffee (I can't say anymore than that - at the time, I couldn't really tell a good cup from a bad cup). We mostly sat around drinking and talking - we saw a couple of boys we knew from Belgravia and they introduced us to some other people, and so we had a pretty good little party going. Mostly it was made up of rich kids - and we slotted in to that grouping pretty well. As Australians, we were just exotic enough to be interesting, not strange enough to be threatening. Quite a lot of the boys were at public schools, and we did talk quite a bit about our schooling - and about how the British public school tradition had transferred to Australia. We also discussed music - and some politics with the earnestness of kids trying to talk about grown up things, we barely understood. And that's when a bit of trouble started. The conversation turned to Vietnam.

There was one young Marxist revolutionary sitting at our table (Marxist revolutionary in the holidays anyway - he was at one of Britain's major public schools most of the time) who started spouting a lot of socialist anti-American propaganda about the conflict. I'm sure he did it all the time - but I suspect this was probably the first time he was spouting it at someone whose father had died fighting in that war. I took offence at some of his extremist comments - and then I started taking offence at even some of the more reasonable ones. We started getting heated and it ended with me inviting him to step outside. We didn't actually get into a fight because some of his friends and some of the boys we knew managed to cool things down and it ended with mutual apologies and the shaking of hands.

Around ten, Amelia and I decided it was time to leave. It wouldn't be wise if we weren't at home when Lucy got back - she probably would have covered for us, if she could, but she'd have used the threat of telling as a way to keep us under her thumbs for weeks afterwards. We headed outside intending to either get the train again, or a cab if we could find one - and walked almost straight into my Marxist friend and an older boy. I tensed up - worried we might still fight. He saw that and laughed.

"Don't be like that, Nathan. I don't fight people for no reason - even tories like you?"

I relaxed and smiled at him. "Glad to hear it. I don't want to bruise my knuckles." All right, I know how stupid that sounds - but I was fifteen and trying to be grown up.

"Where you two going?"

"Back home, if we can find a cab."

The older boy spoke up. "Where's home?"

"Belgravia."

"Oh - that's on our way. I'll give you a lift if you like."

"Great."

He lead us down the street to where he had parked a car in a hospital carpark. It was a nice looking car - I couldn't tell you the make, I'm no expert, but it was new and obviously worth a fair bit. I didn't think that much of it, really - these were rich kids. Having a nice car, or having borrowed their father's - it wasn't surprising.

We got in - Amelia and I piled into the back. And he took off. Now I was worried. He was driving rather unsafely. Too fast - and the traffic was fairly heavy - and without due care and attention. It wasn't quite bad enough for me to ask him to let us out - if we'd been in a city I knew I would have done so, but I was aware that once I got away from locations I knew I didn't know London at all. So we stayed with it.

And then he must have broken some rule because a police car started following us. And he didn't stop.

I called on him to pull over - but he didn't pay any attention. He decided to try and get away. I had no idea where we were or where we were going. The chase lasted only a couple of minutes - a couple of minutes of sheer terror - before he finally pulled up in a small park and he and his friend ran like the wind. The police were only a short distance behind us - and while I might have been able to outrun them, Amelia wasn't wearing clothes you could run in. Besides I had no idea where we were and no idea how to get home. So we waited. And we were taken into custody and taken to a police station.

The police were actually quite nice. They separated us, gave me a cup of tea, and asked me my name and address and how old I was. I answered truthfully - there didn't seem any point lying and I didn't really think I was likely to be in much trouble - at least not legal trouble. I knew I was going to be in a great deal of trouble with the Connollys. But then they told me the car we'd been in was stolen. I clammed up at that point and decided I wasn't going to say anything until Mr Connolly arrived. I knew that Mr Connolly was going to be very angry with me and he would punish me very severely for what I'd done - but I also knew that he would make sure that my rights were protected. I was taken to a cell to wait for him.

Mr Connolly arrived relatively quickly. He was dressed for dinner - and that just added to his aura of authority. He was accompanied by another man dressed the same way - a lawyer he'd been dining with. I was taken to a room where the two of them questioned me very quickly and very efficiently about what had happened, and I told them the truth. I found out later that they'd already done the same with Amelia - and our stories matched. Then the lawyer spoke to the police sergeant, and we were released into Mr Connolly's care. We couldn't tell the police much - I didn't even know the public schoolboy's surname - but what we did know, we certainly told. The Sergeant seemed reasonably happy to let us go - and what I heard of his conversation with Mr Connolly, chilled me to the bone.

"Well, Sir, to be honest with you, I think you can probably deal with this matter much more effectively than the courts could given their age. It's nice to know there are still gentleman around who are prepared to hand out the punishment their children deserve - I'm afraid we see a lot nowadays who don't really seem to care."

"Believe me, Sergeant, they will not do anything like this again when I am done with them. This is behaviour I will not tolerate."

We went outside where our lawyer had summoned a couple of cabs. He took one - we took the other home. It was about 11pm.

Lucy was waiting in the lounge - so was Mrs Connolly. Mr Connolly glared at Lucy.

"And where were you, young lady?"

Her mother spoke up. "We've already discussed that - Miss Burke said she could go out."

"Hmmm... very well, then. Go to bed, Lucy. Amelia, stop that."

Amelia was crying. We were home and she had a pretty keen idea of what was likely to happen next. So did I, but I wasn't as torn up about it as she was.

"I... I... I'm s...s...sorry, Daddy."

"You'll be sorrier in a few minutes."

She became crying harder. Her father gave a loud sigh and walked over to her and put his hand on his shoulder. "I know you're sorry, Amelia, but that's not enough I'm afraid."

"I know."

"Go and use the toilet."

She walked out. Mr Connolly turned to me.

"How do we handle this, Nathan?"

"Sir?"

"You're the same age as Amelia. So I can treat you both the same. But we both know you really are older than her in all the ways that matter. So do I treat you the same as her, or not?"

"Please, Sir. Don't make me decide that."

"Why not? Don't you have an opinion?"

I did have an opinion, but that wasn't the point. I considered - then phrased what I said next very carefully. "I don't want an opinion, Sir. I want you to decide what happens to me. I don't want a say. Sir, please, don't make me decide - make the decision for me." I broke and my voice became unsteady. "Please..."

"Nathan... I don't understand."

"I think I do." Mrs Connolly spoke quietly and came over to me and embraced me. "Nathan - you want us to decide because that's something parents should do for their children, isn't it? Don't be embarrassed. That's all right, dear. That's quite all right."

I just nodded. I couldn't speak. They'd treated me almost as a son - and I wanted them to do that now more than ever. I didn't want the say that he was offering. I wasn't ready for it. I didn't want to be ready for it.

"Ah, I see." Mr Connolly's voice became gruff. "I understand." Then it became tender. "I understand. Very well, Nathan - go and use the toilet - when Amelia's finished, of course. Then come back here."

As I left the room, I could see Mrs Connolly was whispering something to Mr Connolly, but I had no idea what.

After I had done what I needed to do, I returned to the lounge room. One of the armchairs had been moved into the center of the room. Amelia was standing with her head down near the door, and I stepped into position next to her. She was shaking slightly. Mrs Connolly was standing next to the armchair - Mr Connolly was near the fireplace, with the cane in his hand.

"I am not going to belabour the point. You both know why you are here. You knew you should not leave the house and to go across London like that is simply completely unacceptable. I won't make an issue of the police - it's clear to me that while you were foolish to take a lift like that, you didn't know what was going on. Amelia - you first, I think."

"B...but Daddy... N...n...athan... I mean..."

"What is the problem?"

"Aren't you going to send him..."

"No." He spoke firmly. "I am not going to send him away. I will punish you in front of him. And I will punish him in front of you. I know this might be a bit embarrassing for you both, but I don't really care - besides from what Lucy told your mother, it's nothing either of you haven't seen before. Now come here, and let's get this over with."

She slowly - very slowly - shuffled forward. He waited patiently - I think he'd have waited an hour if needed, as long as there was some perceptible forward motion. Amelia arrived behind the chair.

"Bend over."

Slowly - even more slowly than she'd walked - Amelia went over the chair. As soon as she was in position, her mother lifted her skirt, exposing her knicker clad bottom. Her mother whispered something to her, and her whole body shuddered - and she put her legs together tightly. Her mother stepped behind her, blocking her from my view and pulled down her underwear, before stepping away. I now had a clear view of Amelia's bare bottom. Now, yes, I had seen it before - but surreptitiously. I'd never had this type of view.

Mr Connolly lined up the cane, and then brought it back - and swung it down. It was a good, firm stroke. Nothing like the massive swings I'd seen from some of the Masters at school, but they were highly experienced experts. Mr Connolly was a novice and I don't think he intended to hit as hard as they did either. But it was a firm stroke, and Amelia shrieked at it and straightened up. Her hands flew around to cover her bottom.

"Please, no more, Daddy!"

"Five more, actually - six more if you're not back over that chair by the time I count to three. One... two..."

She got back into position. He took aim again and the second stroke was a carbon copy of the first. And so was Amelia's reaction.

Her father roared, "ONE, TWO..."

She struggled back down. "I will not count again, Amelia. You stand up again and I start again right from the start. I don't want to give you more than six - but if you make me, I will do so."

Mrs Connolly placed her hands on her daughters shoulders. I could see the two red lines blossoming on Amelia's bottom - it was quivering. Her whole body was. Mr Connolly looked at his wife and nodded - silent communication but the meaning was clear. Mrs Connolly was going to hold Amelia down so she didn't earn extra strokes.

He brought the cane back up - and brought it down firmly. Amelia shrieked again. Within a second he brought it back up and down again - and then a third time, and finally a fourth. The last four strokes were delivered in rapid succession. Amelia's screaming became worse at each stroke. She was incoherent when she was allowed to stand.

"Dress yourself."

She couldn't obey her fathers instructions. Her mother pulled her knickers up and pulled her skirt down into position and then lead her by the hand over next to where I was standing, and turned her around so she was facing the chair.

"Come here, Nathan."

Once again, I realized I had an erection. It was straining inside my trousers. This time though, I knew I had no excuse to slip away. Mr Connolly knew I'd used the toilet. I advanced fairly slowly - nowhere near as slowly as Amelia, and stepped into position next to the chair. Mrs Connolly stood next to me - and I was mortified at the possibility she might see the state I was in - her husband would be bad enough - she was ten times worse. But what could I do?

She began to unbuckle my belt. My hands went down to do it myself, but she delivered a really hard smack to the back of my right hand, sending a clear message that I was not to interfere. She undid my belt, then unbuttoned my trousers and undid my fly. The front of my underwear was now visible - and the fact I was erect could not have escaped her notice. I cringed, but she showed no sign of noticing anything out of the ordinary.

"Bend over."

I did as I was told. As soon as I was in position, Mrs Connolly tugged down my trousers, and then pulled down my underpants clearing the obstruction at the front. Then she placed her hands on my shoulders.

"I don't need to be held down, Mrs Connolly."

"I don't care what you think you need, Nathan. I'm going to hold your shoulders."

My whole body was pushed forward and immediately after I felt the familiar burn and sting of a cane across my bottom. It wasn't even close to the hardest stroke I'd ever had - but it was certainly a painful experience. It got worse a second or so later. Mr Connolly caned quickly - and as a fairly experienced caner myself I knew that that was a valid enough strategy - you had two choices really - you could extend the pain by caning slowly, or build and build on it by caning quickly. He was taking the second approach - which was only rarely used at my school - it got it over and done with quickly - but it was also more likely to break through your reserves and truth be told I was glad I was being held down by Mrs Connolly. It meant I didn't need to worry about embarrassing myself by standing. The third stroke had me in genuine tears. And by the fourth stroke, I was fully in agreement with what Mr Connolly had been told about this cane - it did have a dreadful sting, and was very nasty indeed. The fifth stroke left me bawling my eyes out, and the sixth left me breathless.

"Stand up."

I stood - and pulled up my underpants and trousers as quickly as I could. My erection was gone - for the moment. My bottom was on absolute fire.

"Now go to bed."

We both headed up to our rooms. I undressed and changed into my pyjamas and climbed almost immediately into bed. Almost as soon as I was in bed, there was a knock on the door and Mrs Connolly came in.

She said nothing. She simply moved around my bed, tucking in the blankets and then bent down and kissed me on the forehead. She turned off the light as she left.

I lay there for a few minutes. My bottom was throbbing but as that subsided a bit, I started thinking about what I had seen and what had happened and my erection returned. I loosened the covers - Mrs Connolly had almost crushed me, she'd tucked me in so tight - and pulled down my pyjama trousers and began to my customary manipulations. I was just getting close to the object of the exercise, when there was a knock on the door.

"Nathan, can I come in?" It was Lucy.

Now I was at the stage where I really didn't want to stop. So in as calm a voice as I could manage, I said "Just a minute." And I finished what I was doing as quickly as I could. Then I quickly pulled up the covers.

"You can come in, now."

The door opened and Lucy turned on the light. She was wearing her dressing gown and slippers over her nightie and she sat down on the end of my bed. She looked at me and spoke.

"Were you wanking?"

"Oh come on!"

"Well, were you? I mean it's all right, if you were. Boys do it a lot, so I'm told."

"Lucy!"

"You were, I know you were."

"So what? It helps with the pain - takes your mind off it."

"I should probably tell Amelia that... Look, Nathan, I just came in to explain."

"You told them." She'd told her mother about Amelia and I spying on each other.

"Yes, I did. I had to. Look - you both vanished together. Mum wanted to know if the pair of you might be - well, you can probably guess - and she wanted to know if you'd been... intimate... in any way."

"You're a dobber." Sounds incredibly childish - and I suspect I sounded very childish and petulant as I said it - but I was feeling that way at that moment.

"No, Nathan - I'm in charge - Mum and Dad made me responsible for you and Amelia, and that means I can't lie to them about something like that. Besides I can't lie to Mum, anyway - she'd have known I was covering something and she would have imagined a lot of worse things. So I told her - and I wanted to explain."

"All right. I'll accept your apology."

"I'm not apologizing, Nathan. I'm explaining. I don't have to apologise to you - you should be apologizing to me."

"What for?"

"You snuck out! I was in charge - and if anything had happened to Amelia or you - anything serious I mean - I'd never forgive myself for going out. You told me you'd cover for me - and then you did something that could have got me in awful trouble -"

"All right - you're right. I'm sorry. We shouldn't have done that."

"I forgive you - but you can do something for me."

"What?"

"Let me see your bottom."

"What? Why?"

"Because there's a good chance, Nathan, that at some point, Dad is going to decide I deserve the cane. And I want to see what it does, properly. Besides, Amelia got to see." Now it was her turn to sound a little petulant.

"I doubt she was paying attention."

"That's her problem - now come on."

"All right. Hang on."

Under the covers my pyjama trousers were still down. I rolled over, so I could cover my most important privacy.

"All right - you can lift the cover now."

She did so - and leaned down to look at the marks.

"No blood."

"There normally isn't."

"People at school talked about blood. Still nasty looking though."

"Have you had enough of a look?"

"Oh... yes." She dropped the cover back into place. "And... what you did... it does help to take the pain away?"

"Well, it helps to take your mind away from the pain anyway. At least it does for me."

"All right... thank you, Nathan."

She stood and went to the door, and switched off the light.

And eventually I fell asleep.