When Philip Lowe walked in for his scheduled grilling by senators on Wednesday, the room went completely silent.
The committee's morning tea chit-chat ended abruptly. All eyes were on the man blamed for the nation's mortgage pain.
But if Lowe was feeling the heat of the daily demands for his resignation and the pot-shots even from members of the government, he didn't show it.
For 90 minutes, the Reserve Bank Governor calmly explained why nine rapid interest rate rises, with the prospect of more to come, were the only way to go.
He tried to show empathy for those doing it "really tough". He understood. He read their letters with a "heavy heart" and found them "personally disturbing".
"We're here to help people," the Governor said, without irony.
While his critics would scoff at the suggestion he's "helping", Lowe mounted a credible argument that the alternative would be far worse.
"We want to get inflation down because it's dangerous," he said. "It's corrosive. It hurts people. It damages income inequality and if it stays high it leads to higher interest rates and more unemployment."
The poor would suffer more than the rich, he said, in comments clearly directed at Greens Senator Nick McKim, who has been among those calling for Lowe's head. It was a powerful point.
Few of those criticising the RBA, including the Greens, have been able to explain what level of inflation they're willing to live with — 4 per cent, 5 per cent? Nor have they explained what impact they think this would have on the most vulnerable.
Lowe, however, isn't completely untroubled by the flack he's copping. He noted the "non-stop around the clock" media commentary, with a nervous giggle. Commentary driven by the likes of McKim. It was "a bit unfair", Lowe ventured, that he cops all the blame, when his board of nine members make collective and apparently unanimous decisions.
But he gets it. Nine successive rate rises are bound to stir anger. Particularly when Lowe himself wrongly led borrowers to believe rates wouldn't be touched until 2024. A bad mistake, for which the Governor still hasn't recovered.
Nothing but nice things to say of the government
Lowe puts much of the current criticism down to collective amnesia.
"I think people have forgotten" the "corrosive" impact of inflation 30 years ago, he said.
This general and gentle reminder to remember the lessons of history was as close as the Governor came to hitting back at his critics, including those within the government.
Despite the repeated invitations from Liberal senators to fire up at the various Labor MPs telling him how to do his job, Lowe remained calm. "It's a free country, people are free to express their views," he said.
Even criticism from Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones, who has repeatedly declared the rate hikes should stop, left Lowe unfazed. He didn't feel the independence of the RBA was "under attack".
Indeed, the Governor had nothing but nice things to say about a government that's been barely willing to defend him.
Labor's fiscal policy was "not problematic" he said, dismissing Coalition concerns about too much spending. Russia's invasion of Ukraine was "substantially" to blame for the problem the world is facing.
Lowe also strongly backed the Government's energy price caps, opposed by the Coalition. They will reduce inflation by half a percentage point: "That's meaningful, that's helpful."
He even tempered concerns expressed just last week about excessive wage growth. The risk of a wage-growth spiral, he now conceded, was "relatively low". This was far more in line with the views of the Treasurer.
A banker's banquet and another grilling to come
There was only one moment in yesterday's hearing where Lowe looked genuinely uncomfortable.
McKim raised the Governor's private lunch last week with a "bunch of bankers at the Barrenjoey banquet". As revealed by the Australian Financial Review, Lowe shared his thoughts with bank traders on Thursday, before saying anything publicly about his latest rate rise and the future direction of monetary policy.
"If I had my time again, I'd do things differently," he said. The mea culpa was over the timing, not the fact of the lunch. It won't happen again, he assured. At least not when he's yet to publicly issue a monetary policy statement. Sitting down with well-paid bankers at a time when he's accused of ignoring battlers, was indeed a bad look.
In his final words to the Senate hearing, Lowe again implored the committee to remember "the Reserve Bank is more than just me".
The truth is the government has in its sights both the Governor and his board. The Treasurer will receive a landmark review of the RBA, its structure and how it communicates decisions, by the end of next month. Jim Chalmers will decide by the middle of the year whether to extend Lowe's term and shake up the entire board.
More immediately, Lowe will be back in the hot seat on Friday for a second parliamentary grilling this week. This one is likely to be tougher than Wednesday's warm-up.
He'll face three hours before the House Economics Committee, which includes some well-credentialed economists and MPs armed with more direct feedback from struggling and angry constituents.
David Speers is the host of Insiders, which airs on ABC TV at 9am on Sunday or on iview, and host of the Back to You Podcast, out Fridays.