In While Mortals Sleepmen and machines, art and artifice, fortune and fame become curiously twisted. A travelling salesman falls in love a robot, Jenny, a refrigerator with personality. A man plays with his model trains too much until the women in his life decide to take matters into their own hands.A young typist receives a plea for help on her Dictaphone - it is from an escaped, dying murderer hiding somewhere in the works of her company's factory. In the title story, a hard-nosed reporter is called upon to judge the annual Christmas lights competition - a job that leads him to learn something about the true meaning of Christmas.