‘I didn’t say I knew that. I said I googled it once.’ I was picking Cedar up from school. I was there five minutes early. It was a cold day, so none of us left our cars. We all sat there in our driver’s seats, scrolling on our phones.

‘Jacques-Louis David.’ He sets the magnifying glass on the bench and stands up straighter. ‘1812. He was painting Napoleon from memory for a Scottish fan. It was a commission. It’s an eighteenth-century pose, British and American actually, showing manly boldness. Then Napoleon saw the David portrait and went, “I’m having more of that, thanks,” and kept being painted that way. True story.’

‘Brilliant.’ I already want to tell Cedar, though he’d beg me to stop. He’s stuck his hand in his shirt once or twice, added what he thinks is a French accent and strutted around doing Napoleon. ‘You can bet I’ll be slipping that into an essay one day. Assuming people still study Napoleon.’

‘Michael’s doing a history degree,’ Simon says.

‘About to, anyway. And this Napoleon was given to me by a retired high-school history teacher who’s kind of my mentor. I wonder if she knows the hand thing, the real story.’ My hand slides across my shirtfront, miming the action before I can stop it.

‘They don’t do anywhere near enough battles now for me, in school history,’ Brian says. ‘Much more focus on the social stuff. Give me a clash of empires any day. Endless figurine possibilities.’

Simon steps out from behind him. ‘Is that part of the degree? The mentor?’ The Girdwood Brewing T-shirt is bunched in his armpits, its map of Alaska taut on his chest.

‘No. I found her myself. I sold her house for her. Got a good price for it, too.’ Reasonable price. Three thirty-six five. Not that I did a lot to get it there. Two interested buyers does that.

‘So,’ Brian says, ‘you sell real estate, you import shit from China and now you’re going to, what, teach history?’

‘Yeah, I live in the ultimate one-horse town. I have clean pliers if anyone needs any dentistry. So, the arm not being in the jacket . . .’ I point towards Napoleon. ‘Does that mean it’s more likely to be pre-1812?’

‘No.’ He pauses. ‘It mostly means it’s not made by an idiot. Figurines like this are Victorian or Edwardian, typically. Not pre-1812. But the likelihood of it being a model of Napoleon?’ He hands me the magnifying glass and picks up the figurine. ‘The hat is right. The structure of it’s right – the way the bits are sandwiched together – and, if you take a close look, I think you can see flecks of red and blue on the cockade. Simon? Any thoughts?’

Simon puts on a serious face. ‘Well, from the epaulets, this guy’s at least a colonel. Right? White breeches is correct, but not unique to Napoleon.’