“You can do that?”

“Anytime.”

Two Georges in residence at the mint-green apartment complex recast as Peace Gardens Retirement Center. George Bannahyde was wheelchair-bound and never left the building. George Kaplan, “one of our healthier ones,” resided in a second-story room.

Too many old-age homes are hovels designed to stuff owners’ pockets with taxpayer largesse. This one was clean, fresh smelling, softly lit, with snacks in abundance and well-fed, nicely groomed residents playing board games, exercising on mats, watching movies on wide-screen TVs. A posted schedule listed activities every daylight hour, mealtimes excepted.

Milo assured the desk clerk that Mr. Kaplan wasn’t in trouble, just the opposite, he was important to LAPD.

She said, “George?”

“Is he in?”

“Up in his room. I can call him down if you’d like.”

“No, that’s fine, we’ll just drop in.”

Lots of head-turns as Milo and I walked past the activity. We climbed the stairs to a freshly vacuumed corridor. Bouncy brown carpeting, mock-adobe walls, burnt-orange doors equipped with name slots.

G. Kaplan’s door was open. A small, round-backed, light-skinned black man sat on a neatly tucked bed, wearing a white shirt buttoned to the neck, knife-pressed maroon slacks, spit-polished black-and-white wingtips. Skimpy silver hair was pomaded to iridescence. Gray-blue eyes, not that different in hue from mine, studied us with amusement. A box of Tam Tam crackers, a bottle of dry-roasted peanuts, and a setup for instant coffee sat on a nightstand. The wall above the headboard bore portraits of Martin Luther King and Lyndon Johnson, the latter signed.

Two chairs faced the bed. George Kaplan said, “Sit, Gemma called from downstairs, officers, all ready for you.”

Singsong cadence, velvety intonation; maybe one of New Orleans’s many variants. His eyes were serene but both hands trembled and his head rocked at irregular intervals. Parkinson’s disease or something like it.

“Thanks for meeting with us, Mr. Kaplan.”

“Nothing else to do.” Kaplan’s lips parted. Too-white dentures clacked. “What does law enforcement have in mind with relation to George S. Kaplan?”

Milo studied the photos before settling. “LBJ? Usually it’s JFK.”

“George S. Kaplan isn’t usual. Those Kennedys were fine, if you like pretty faces. President Johnson didn’t look like a movie star—Lord, those ears, he got no respect. But it was him pushed through legislation to smooth out the races.”

“The Great Society.”

“He was a dreamer, same as Dr. King. I did the man’s shoes, Ambassador Hotel. The president, not Dr. King, unfortunately. Had a stand there for forty-eight and a half years. Was there the night RFK got shot, tried to tell the cops I’d seen that Jordanian lunatic skulking around the hotel for days, muttering to himself. No one cared what I have to say.”

“We care.”

Kaplan massaged a pearl shirt button, fought to still his hands. “Know how old I am?”

“You look good, sir.”