‘The darkish blue-grey greatcoat,’ Brian says, almost tangling the words. ‘Bit of a tongue twister there. It could go either way. You often see him in a lighter blue-grey, more grey, which sets him apart, but some paint colours change with time and he also had the darker one, so . . .’

‘The lighter coat would have made it easier to say it was him, maybe,’ Simon says, ‘but . . . This guy’s a senior French officer in the Napoleonic Wars. I think we can be pretty sure about that, at least.’

‘More than that,’ Brian says. ‘That’s a green jacket or fitted coat under his greatcoat. He’s in the uniform of a colonel of the Chasseurs à Cheval, even down to the sword and the sword knot.’ He points to the tiny bare metal knot and tassel hanging from the hilt of the sword. There’s a seam of gold paint caught between the cord and the man’s thigh.

‘A colonel . . .’ I don’t want to tell Ellen this was just an anonymous colonel, to turn up back in Girdwood talking Walter’s story down. Perhaps, a generation or two back, when this soldier was the last survivor from a set, Napoleon seemed the obvious name to give him.

‘And we know who sometimes wore the uniform of a colonel of the Chasseurs à Cheval,’ Brian says. ‘Don’t we?’

Simon nods. ‘Napoleon.’

‘But is it him? . . . Hang on a tick. That line of red beneath the edge of the chasseur coat . . .’ He steers my hand across so that he can check the soldier again through the magnifying glass. ‘There’s paint loss on the chest, but if that’s the edge of a red sash beneath the jacket – it’s not on the other side, and that fits with it being a sash – and that shape on the left is a star . . .’

Simon breathes in sharply. ‘A chasseur colonel who’s wearing a Legion of Honour Grand Eagle badge? Now you’re talking.’

‘Ha! We should be doing this on Antiques Roadshow.’ Brian straightens up again. ‘There are quite a few hints that it’s Napoleon. It’s a fun game to play, even if there’s a bit too much wear and tear to be certain.’

‘A definite maybe,’ Simon says. ‘Funny old piece, though . . .’

‘But then this guy, the Austrian.’ Brian lines the two figurines up shoulder to shoulder. ‘He’s a senior officer, but Feldmarchall-Leutnant max, right?’ He slides a piece of paper across and points to the Feldmarchall-Leutnant among the row of officers’ uniforms. ‘That’s like a, what, brigadier? He’s not the Kaiser. Not even Archduke Charles, say, if you’re thinking battles like Aspern-Essling and Wagram. So, they’re not an obvious pair, emperor and brigadier. If they’re part of a set, it must have been a pretty big set. And I’ve never heard of it, not as a factory product. There was the Russian imperial set – the Tsar’s own, made by a jeweller – of soldiers from the Napoleonic Wars. It was big, but there’s no record of it having an Austrian, so it’s not that.’ He picks the two figures up, one in each hand, testing the weights against each other. ‘I’m not even sure they’re lead. Iron, maybe? Who made iron soldiers in the late nineteenth century?’ He looks at Simon, and then at me.