provost ordered Benedetta to cut her hair and wash her head to make the wounds more visible. Benedetta was allowed to leave the room briefly to rearrange and close her garments before returning for further questioning. Suddenly she run back in, holding her hands to her head. "Jesus, what is this?" she exclaimed as blood gushed down her face and onto the floor. The visitors managed to staunch the blood with towels. But the examination had to be cut because Benedetta was in too much pain to continue. But this was not the end of the investigation, just a postponement. In June 1619, Benedetta revealed to Father Ricordati that she had again seen Jesus in a vision. This time he was an angry and vengeful Christ with an unsheathed sword ready to strike. And he threatened to punish the people of Pescia with the plague for their grievous sins while no one was willing to ask for mercy. Benedetta offered to pray for his mercy herself and to be the instrument of the town's salvation by spending her time in Purgatory until the day of judgment. Christ's anger seemed to be appeased by her words. He told her to continue to love him always and to arrange for processions to placate him. Ricordati gave her permission to organize a procession with an image of Christ at the head. On July 23, Cecchi met with Felice di Giovanni Guerrini, Bartolomea Crivelli and with another nun, Margherita d'Iptolito Ricordati, a relative to Paolo Ricordati. Their testimonies did not result in any major new revelations. The main obstacle to officially sanctioned public recognition was the absence of a ring on Benedetta's finger. Other nuns were unable to see it because she always covered up that hand. But Margherita Ricordati said that she saw a yellow band with a cross that didn't look like a ring. When Benedetta was called to the examination room, she had an ordinary, inexpensive gold ring on the fourth finger of her right hand. On the top side of a ring, there were five points the size of ordinary pinheads. A point in the middle was dark red. The ecclesiastical examiners were eager to probe further, but Benedetta was feeling too ill to answer. Finally, the provost of Pescia Stefano Checchi and other investigators had concluded that Benedetta's visions were genuine visions and neither dreams nor fantasies, and their