The Garda squad car and three uniform gardaí were the only things to suggest anything out of the ordinary on Thursday at Drumalee Avenue, as it bathed in glorious sunshine.
Half a dozen boys with a football made good use of the patch of grass by the corner of the North Circular Road and Aughrim Street as the Garda kept a dutiful but low-key eye on who was coming and going.
Outside No 8, the Hutch family home, they put up an easel with a large portrait photograph, bedecked with white flowers topped off with a yellow ribbon, of Johnny and Vera's son, Gareth.
The Seagull
Nicknamed by some of his friends as the Seagull, Hutch is the latest victim of the war in which the Kinahans are seemingly intent on wiping out an entire family.
Father of one Gareth, a nephew of Gerry “the Monk” Hutch, was victim number seven in the increasingly one-sided “feud”. He was murdered on May 24th as he got into his car at Avondale House flats on North Cumberland Street in Dublin’s north inner city, shot dead by two assailants seen on CCTV.
On Thursday, the children kicked the ball, dribbling past each other with the sort of seemingly effortless skill that bespeaks dedication. Best among them was Calum Hutch, 11- year-old godson of the man lying in repose in the coffin inside No 8.
“He was the best,” said Calum of his uncle. “I’m his godson,” he added with pride, banging the ball off the wall nonchalantly. The young man is a keen player with Stella Maris, the schoolboy club.
Paying respects
A trickle of people came to pay their respects, many on foot, some in white vans, some in cars. The garda nodded them past the checkpoint at the entrance to the estate, occasionally pointing people in the direction of the avenue. There, a large letter wreath was also laid out below the window of Johnny and Vera’s home. “Neighbour” it spelled in flowers.
At six they said prayers inside the house – a private moment for a family whose mourning will be on public display at the funeral on Friday, around the corner at the Church of the Holy Family on Aughrim Street.
The lads chatted with the gardaí, resuming kicking the ball as the mood took hold.
“Here,” said Calum, “what are you going to write in the paper? They shouldn’t have put the video on Facebook, so they shouldn’t. Who did that?”
As the return home from work continued and the streets around the small estate got busier, some residents sat outside their homes sunning themselves. When death comes in gangland, it is sudden, violent and merciless. Afterwards there’s an odd, fragile normality. The kids just play football. And think.
