Carroll John Daly 
Alias Buttercup [EPUB ebook] 
Race Williams #10 (Black Mask)

Mexican Joe was a sore eye and a bad tooth to the New York City Police Department. So, when he spread-eagled out of a twenty-second story window of a skyscraper and ended as mush amid the Brooklyn traffic, no one batted an eye. Except for Race Williams. A sure buck and a good lead compelled him to the scent of a fresh kill, and the end of a smoking gun. Having narrowly escaped his own close encounter with death, Race Williams must work against a mysterious shadow in the stormy city to solve Mexican Joe’s murder and save his own life in the process. Story #10 in the Race Williams series.

Carroll John Daly (1889–1958) was the creator of the first hard-boiled private eye story, predating Dashiell Hammett’s first Continental Op story by several months. Daly’s classic character, Race Williams, was one of the most popular fiction characters of the pulps, and the direct inspiration for Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer.