March and Maxine go back to the co-opping frenzy of ten or fifteen years ago, when landlords were reverting to type and using Gestapo techniques to get sitting tenants to move. The money they offered was contemptuously little, but some renters went for it. Those who didn’t got a different treatment. Apartment doors removed for “routine maintenance,” garbage uncollected, attack dogs, hired goons, eighties pop played really loud. Maxine noticed March on a picket line of neighborhood gadflies, old lefties, tenants’-rights organizers and so forth, in front of a building over on Columbus, waiting for the union’s giant inflatable rat to show up. Picket-sign slogans included RATS WELCOME—LANDLORD’S FAMILY and CO-OP—CRUEL OFFENSIVE OUTRAGEOUS PRACTICES. Undocumented Colombians carried furniture and household possessions out to the sidewalk, trying to ignore the emotional uproar. [...]