Sneerers and prophane wits may perhaps laugh at her first fright; yet my graver reader, when he considers the time of night, the summons from her bed, and the situation in which she found her master, will highly justify and applaud her conduct […]

Next morning I phoned McKinley from the kiosk around the corner and made a point of meeting up with him at a nearby fish-and-chipper.

a black-hatted, broomsticked witch

a calendar of bills presented in a legislative assembly; a calendar of causes arranged for trial in court