Susan waited until her eyes made the adjustment from the fluorescent world below to the semidarkness above. Eventually outlines took forms and Susan could move ahead along the pipes. She noticed a row of studs which continued through the ceiling space to connect with the concrete above. She guessed that they marked the wall of the corridor.
Progress was slow; it was difficult to move on the pipes, treading on one, keeping hold of another or, here and there, a stud for support. She did not want to make any noise, especially when she guessed she was over the area of the main desk. Once over the OR area itself, the going became definitely easier. The ceilings over the OR and the recovery room were fixed and made of prestressed concrete. Susan could move at will provided she avoided tripping on the piping and provided she bent over considerably, for the space here was only about three feet high.
Susan found a concrete wall which she guessed housed the elevator shafts. Then she discovered that the corridor of the OR area had a dropped ceiling. Beyond the OR corridor, over what was probably part of central supply, Susan could see that the maze of pipes and ducts running through the ceiling space converged in what seemed a tangled vortex. Susan guessed that was the location of the central chase which housed all the piping and ducts coursing vertically in the building.
Susan was interested primarily in locating room No. 8. But that was not easy. There were no specific demarcations from one OR to the next The pipes seemed to spread out and dive through the concrete to the operating rooms below in utter anarchy. The corridor ceiling led to a solution. By carefully picking up the edges of the ceiling blocks over the corridor, Susan was able to orient herself and locate the ceiling area of rooms No. 8 and No. 10. Susan satisfied herself that the number and configuration of the pipes to and from the two rooms were identical.
The gas lines corresponding to the painted intake connectors she had seen down below in the ORs had the same color codes in the ceiling space. Over room No. 8, Susan found the oxygen line with a splash of green paint. Susan traced the oxygen line from room No. 8. It coursed back to the edge of the corridor then bent at a right angle to run parallel to it, alongside similar oxygen lines coming from other ORs. As Susan passed additional OR rooms, more lines joined the oxygen line she was trailing. In order to be sure she was still following the pipe from No. 8, Susan kept her finger on it all the way to the edge of the central chase. Then her finger hit something. In the dim light she had to bend over to see what it was. She saw a stainless steel female connector. Just over the edge of the chase carrying the pipes up from the hospital depths was a high-pressure T-valve on the oxygen line leading to room No. 8.
Susan stared at the valve. She looked at the other gas lines coming up the chase. There were no similar valves on any of the other lines. With her finger she examined the valve. It was obvious that the oxygen could be tapped from the line at that point. But equally as possible was that something, another gas, could be bled into the oxygen line at the same point.
Keeping to the fixed ceilings of the ORs, Susan worked her way back to the area of the main desk. Then she began the difficult part of crossing the large expanse of non-fixed ceiling. Wishing she had dropped some bread crumbs in the forest of pipes, Susan was forced to reconnoiter. She lifted a corner of a ceiling tile, but it was over the hall. She lifted another tile only to find herself over the doctors’ lounge. The third tile was over the nurses’ locker, but too far from the lockers she needed to step on. The fourth tile was perfect, and Susan descended with little difficulty.
Thursday, February 26, 1:00 A.M.
Like any major city, Boston never completely goes to sleep. But unlike many a major city, Boston becomes almost silent. As Susan settled back in the taxi speeding along Storrow Drive, only two or three cars passed, all going in the opposite direction. She was very tired, and she craved sleep. It had been an unbelievable day.