The Glass Key — Dashiell Hammett

Ned Beaumont is a gambler and a professional troubleshooter for his friend Paul Madvig, a cheerfully corrupt political power broker who aspires to greater things. Madvig has his eyes set on none other than the daughter of Senator Ralph Bancroft Henry, the heiress to a dynasty of political purebreds. When the senator's son turns up dead, Madvig becomes the prime suspect. But if he is innocent, then which of his dozens of enemies is doing an awfully good job of framing him?

Dashiell Hammett's tour de force of crime fiction combines a bulletproof plot, authentically corrupt characters, and writing of telegraphic crispness.