With six days remaining until he goes to the electric chair for the murder of his wife, wealthy broker Robert Westland needs help, fast. He insists that he has been framed, and Bill Crane, a private detective with a method and manner all his own, must prove his client's innocence.

In a mixture of the humorous and the macabre, Crane's investigation, set against an evocative Depression-era backdrop, turns up more than a few queer characters - including a tight-lipped valet and a dypsomanic widow - who may or may not know something about who really murdered Mrs Westland.