He took the card, finally, between two fingers, and held it up under the fluorescent light in the shack.
It looked like a TWIC card. White with the blue band across the top, the eagle, the gold chip, the little holographic seal that shifted when you tilted it. The name said RANIA I MANSOUR. The photo showed a woman's face framed by a dark scarf, looking straight at the camera with no expression. It could have been her. It could have been any woman in a scarf. That was the thing that went through Wade's head, in those exact words, and he did not examine them: it could be any of them, under that thing.
He looked from the card to her face and back again, slowly, three times, the way Fuselier had told him to.
"This is a federal credential," he said. "I'm required to verify the identity of the bearer."
"I know. That's what the fingerprint reader is for, the one that's broken. I'm happy to give you a thumbprint if you've got a handheld unit in there."
He did not have a handheld unit. Sentinel had promised one in August. He felt his face get warm.
"What I'm going to need," he said, "is for you to take that off your head so I can compare the photo."
The woman did not move, and did not look away from him, and something in her face went still, not angry, just very still, the way the air outside was still.
"No," she said. "I'm not going to do that. The photo on that card was taken with my hijab on, at a TSA enrollment center, by federal staff, because that's how the federal government allows it to be taken, so you're comparing it to exactly what it's supposed to be compared to. My whole face is visible. My ears and hair are not part of the photo. If you need a further check, I'll step out of the car and go into the shack with a female officer, if you have one on shift. Or you can call my dispatch, and they will describe me to you. Or you can call your ops, who have me on their list. Any of those. But I need you to do it fast, sir. That front is going to be here in about fifteen minutes."
Wade did not have a female officer on shift. There was no other officer on shift at all. There was Wade, and the white shack, and a phone, and a radio.