“She felt someone looking at her and turned. The young brakeman stood watching her tensely.”
She wasn’t whistling dixie. While it is common enough to hear the expression, studies thus far have failed to bear this out. What psychological phenomenon might give rise to this. It might make sense from a manifestation of guilt - an extension of a supernatural recorder keeping a record for the day of judgment . . . but whistling a melody she heard being whistled absent mindedly?