a rude hand smote upon her mouth. She fell back unconscious.

Let us follow backward the thread of our story into the Pixie's camp
where we left Spite keeping his solitary watch, that we may account for
this sudden appearance in the heart of the Brownie encampment. Spite
could not sleep. Anger, mortification, hate, disappointed ambition, all
the evil passions were ablaze within him, as he thought of what the
Brownies had already gained, and of their assured victory on the morrow.
His troops discouraged, provisions cut off, Madam Breeze (for aught he
knew) ready to side again with the Brownies,--his utter defeat, the loss
of the fort, and the massacre of his people seemed certain.

"If we could abandon the fort," he muttered; "if we could quietly steal
out and leave the enemy watching an empty camp? That would be our
salvation! But we can't; those troopers of MacWhirlie's are patrolling
the plain, and the woods in the rear are swarming with pickets. But--I
don't know?--"

He sprang to his feet, crossed over to Hide's quarters in Fort
Tegenaria, bade him join him, and walked hastily to the line of
breastworks on the lake front. He stopped under a bush that stood within
the entrenchment. The night was cloudless, and by the moonlight
streaming through the leaves, the two Pixies saw stretched among the
upper branches a round, vertical web. It was the inner abutment of a
bridge that once extended from Fort Spinder to Lakeside, but had been
long in disuse.

"Do you know the condition of the Old Bridge?" asked Spite. "It has been
a long time since I crossed it."

"I know little, except that I have heard some of my boys say that the
piers on this end are in pretty good condition, and that some of the
cables are still up."

[Illustration: FIG. 43.--"A Round, Vertical Web"--p. 86.]

"Very well," said Spite, after musing a few moments, "let us explore a
little. You always used to be ready for a scout, Hide, and I suppose
have not forgotten your old cunning. The Brownie sentinels are just
beyond us, there. Yon big fellow's beat runs under the middle of the
second span."

Hide was quite as ready for the adventure as Spite. Without more words
the two swung themselves into the bushes, climbed up the sides of the
abutment wall, and were presently at the top.

"Here are the cables, at any rate," said Hide. "Only two of them,
however. The rest are broken off. They hang down the sides of the
abutment, and over the ends of the b