The man who lost his voice was a gentle man who didn’t ask terribly much of life. He lived in a miniature space in a single-room-occupancy residence on the corner of 74th Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan, above J. G. Melon, the popular restaurant and bar known for succulent hamburgers. And he was a New York story.
His story revolves around a pair of doormen. In 1994, Jorge Grisales became a night doorman at the Mayfair, an apartment building at 207 East 74th Street. His shift began at midnight, when the city slows down but keeps breathing. When you are a doorman, you notice things. You especially notice recurring people.
Mr. Grisales became aware of a man who almost nightly ambled past the building. He had a glistening face with a trimmed beard and he sported a big smile. Six-foot-something. As he walked, he would bend down and dutifully scoop up litter, tidying up the neighbourhood. One sweaty summer evening, the smiling man waved at the doorman and paused. Mr. Grisales said, “How are you?” The man clutched scraps of paper. He wrote something down and handed it over. It said: “Hi, my name is Bernhardt but call me Ben. I can’t talk, but I can hear.”
Something instantly clicked between them. There was a delicious spirit about Ben. Two years later, Juan Arias joined the door staff, and Mr. Grisales introduced him to Ben. They, too, clicked. They talked. He wrote. On his notes, he always drew a smiley face.
Over time, the two doormen learned some blurred snippets about Ben Wichmann. That his parents came from Germany to Davenport, Iowa. That he was born in 1932. That he had served in the United States Army and was in the Korean War. That he came to New York and became an architectural draftsman. That, among other things, he worked on closets as well as decks and porches for houses in the Hamptons. That he loved opera and classical music. That he was gay. That he had a sister. That his parents and sister were dead and he had no family.
And that in 1983 he had polyps removed from his larynx, and that he had not been able to speak since. He wasn’t entirely sure why. They discovered that since 1991, Ben had lived in that tiny third-floor room down the block that cost $10 a day. He had few possessions and eked by on Social Security. In a city where so many have so much, he had practically nothing. Yet it was enough, always enough. And inside him beat a heart bigger than a mountain.
He seemed unrelievedly happy. That happiness bounced off him and settled on others. People up and down the block came to know Ben. He always petted people’s dogs. Admired the flowers. His cheery presence made East 74th Street brighter than it would have been without him.
“He charmed people,” Mr. Grisales said. “He always smiled. He never complained. He was just wonderful.” Mr. Arias said: “He had plenty of reasons to be unhappy. But I never saw him unhappy.” Now and then, he would stop in at J. G. Melon, plant himself at the bar and have a glass of wine and maybe a salad and converse through his written expressions with customers and the staff.
He would bring the doormen coffee and a Spanish newspaper. And they would fall into meandering exchanges — spoken words from the doormen, scribbling from Ben. Oh how they relished one another’s company.
Mr. Grisales was shaky with his English. That was why he worked the midnight shift. Ben tutored him. If Mr. Grisales mispronounced a word, he would write out how to say it, which syllables to emphasise, what words it rhymed with. Mr. Grisales polished his English and graduated to an earlier shift.
The doormen gave Ben gifts — shirts or shoes, things he needed. So did others on the block. Joan Gralla, a reporter at Newsday who lives near the Mayfair, gave him sweaters, hats, a yellow rain slicker. For years, she got him a ticket to the Metropolitan Opera. He would dress up in his best clothes and have the time of his life. She would tell him the ticket was from her dog, Clementine. Once, when the seat was exceptional, he wrote that Clementine must have some pull. “Ben was just magical in bringing out the best in people,” Ms. Gralla said.
Ben had many medical issues. He came to rely on the doormen to make — or cancel — doctor appointments. If something was urgent, he would write out the note to them in red ink.
