Ok, thank you again.
I avow that you're really as merciless wordsmiths as one can hardly imagine. I'm always trying to improve my English - you're right - but in this particular case I just have to traslate the text - not exactly for fun, nor precisely for masochism.
Anyway, you're assistance has been useful and I'm still here to accept suggestions and clues. In the meanwhile I'll try to figure out how many meanings "people hanging from steampipes" could bear.