For the brothers Foster were thinking of retiring from business, and
relinquishing the shop to their two shopmen, Philip Hepburn and
William Coulson. To be sure, it was only by looking back for a few
months, and noticing chance expressions and small indications, that
this intention of theirs could be discovered. But every step they
took tended this way, and Philip knew their usual practice of
deliberation too well to feel in the least impatient for the quicker
progress of the end which he saw steadily approaching. The whole
atmosphere of life among the Friends at this date partook of this
character of self-repression, and both Coulson and Hepburn shared in
it. Coulson was just as much aware of the prospect opening before
him as Hepburn; but they never spoke together on the subject,
although their mutual knowledge might be occasionally implied in
their conversation on their future lives. Meanwhile the Fosters were
imparting more of the background of their business to their
successors. For the present, at least, the brothers meant to retain
an interest in the shop, even after they had given up the active
management; and they sometimes thought of setting up a separate
establishment as bankers. The separation of the business,--the
introduction of their shopmen to the distant manufacturers who
furnished their goods (in those days the system of 'travellers' was
not so widely organized as it is at present),--all these steps were
in gradual progress; and already Philip saw himself in imagination
in the dignified position of joint master of the principal shop in
Monkshaven, with Sylvia installed as his wife, with certainly a silk
gown, and possibly a gig at her disposal. In all Philip's visions of
future prosperity, it was Sylvia who was to be aggrandized by them;
his own life was to be spent as it was now, pretty much between the
four shop walls.