Queen's Park meekly surrendered two points against Hampden against Arbroath thanks to a late David Crawford error which let Smokies defender Ian Dobbins powerfully head home.
Queen's had been 1-0 down thanks to a powerful Jay Stein strike a minute after the half time interval had ended. Kevin Proctor's debut strike which he slipped through the legs of Mark Peat gave Queen's the equaliser.
Almost instantly The Spiders took the lead. Alan Trouten was chopped down in the box, and he calmly dispatched the resulting spot kick past Peat.
Queen's could have wrapped up the points late on when Bryan Felvus was unleashed one-on-one with Peat but his cheeky lob trickled wide of the mark.
Dobbins struck with a late header to keep the Red Litchies off the bottom of the league table.
QUEEN'S PARK: Crawford, Clark, Dunlop, McGinty, Sinclair, Trouten, Kettlewell, Quinn, Proctor (Felvus), Weatherston, Ferry (Weir)
GOALSCORERS: Proctor, Trouten (pen)
REFEREE: Stephen Finnie
ATTENDANCE: 446