Edwardes gave Hicks the chance to star in his next show, "The Shop Girl" (1894), which became a hit at the Gaiety in 1894, playing for 546 performances. Hicks's wife joined Edwardes's company during the run of the show, replacing the star in the title role, and together they made the musical an even bigger hit. The following year, Hicks transferred with the show to Broadway for a short run and then toured in America in 1895 with his wife, where they befriended the American novelist Richard Harding Davis. At the instance of W. S. Gilbert, Hicks wrote a drama called "One of the Best", a vehicle for his father-in-law William Terriss at the Adelphi Theatre, based on the famous Dreyfus Trial. The Hickses were frequent guests of Gilbert at his estate in Grim's Dyke. Hicks hurried back from America for the opening in December 1895. It ran for over a year.