This paper dissects Israel Zangwill's mystery novel The Big Bow Mystery and analyzes it in terms of other mystery-novel standards: logical consistency, character evenness, and distraction (e.g. "red herrings"). It concludes that although the novel also functions as a critique of Victorian society, the novel itself has great worth as a mystery due to its supreme internal consistency, hard to achieve in the "locked room" subgenre. 7 pgs. Bibliography lists 1 source.