"I've lasted very well, don't you think?" asked Mystery Writer Agatha Christie last week on her 80th birthday as she received reporters at her Berkshire, England, home. "I must have stamina." Stamina indeed. The occasion also marked the publication in England of Agatha's 80th novel, Passenger to Frankfurt. "I call the book an extravaganza," she said, "but evidently it is not quite as extravagant or fantastic as I had supposed." Why? The plot involves a fictional event that this month became fact: the hijacking of four passenger airliners in Africa.

"I took to it quickly," explained Sophia Loren, "probably because I'm tall." As she arrived in Paris for a visit last week, Sophia was wearing it -- a midi --in the form of a loose-fitting suit. The result was enough to give pause to the most enthusiastic advocate of the mid-calf look. If the midi makes So phia look ungainly, what must it do to women who are merely beautiful?

Piraeus Public Prosecutor Constantine Fafoutis accused him of "inflicting le thal injuries" on his wife Eugenie, and asked for an indictment (TIME, Aug. 31). Greek Shipping Magnate Stavros Niarchos insisted that he had bruised her only while attempting to revive her after she had taken an overdose of barbiturates. Last week a panel of three judges sided with the defendant and ruled that "no charges should be pressed. After telephoning the good news to his uncle, Niarchos' Nephew Constantine Dracopoulos announced to newsmen: "Mr. Niarchos never doubted that Greek justice, with its reputation for strict impartiality and fairness, would finally vindicate him." The prosecutor can appeal to a higher court.

What qualified Tricia Nixon for her appointment by her father last week to the board of trustees of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts? According to a White House source, "It was her great interest in the theater and her constant visits to museums." Executive Director William McCormick Blair Jr., in the Kennedy years Ambassador to Denmark, enthusiastically welcomed his youngest board member. "We're delighted," said Blair. "It shows the interest of the President."

Sibling rivalry is one thing, but Juanita Castro may well be carrying it to an extreme. In Kyoto, Japan, last week for an anti-Communist rally, Fidel Castro's younger sister--who once helped raise funds for his revolutionary movement--could not contain her antagonisms. "It was true that the Cuban people were in miserable conditions under the Batista dictatorship," said Juanita, who has been living in Miami since defecting from Cuba in 1964, "but Castro's dictatorship has made it worse." For the sake of democracy in Cuba, she dramatically added, she would even go so far as to kill her brother.

Humorist S.J. Perelman, 66, finds little to laugh about any more in the U.S. So, he announced last week that he was moving to London for good. Explained Perelman: "I think Swift said that life is not only nasty and brutish, but short. That seemed to me a perfect description of life in a termitary like New York." However, Perelman fans will probably not be deprived of his lampooning. "Today," he told a New York Times reporter, "the news in this country is so filled with insanity and violence that the newspapers have scant room for the sort of thing that turns me on--the bizarre. In Britain they still have the taste for eccentricity."

One of the few remaining male sanctuaries was violated last week when tall, shapely Phyllis Shantz, 24, was sworn in as the first female agent of the Secret Service. A University of Maryland graduate in sociology and criminology and a former District of Columbia policewoman, Phyllis was appointed to the new Executive Protective Service and could be assigned to Mrs. Nixon or Tricia. Although feminists hailed the appointment as another step toward equality, Phyllis seemed pleased with the effectiveness of her difference. "The men," she bubbles, "are just as nice as they can be. I don't know if they are this nice to other men."

He has been outside his country only once--50 years ago when, as Crown Prince, he went on a state visit to Europe. That journey, 69-year-old Emperor Hirohito made clear, had been the high point of his life. "I'm full of memories of the trip," he said during a rare interview at his summer palace. "Until then my existence in the palace had been like that of a caged bird." Earlier, the Emperor accepted a sketch of a wild-flower from the Empress, who has even more reason to be wistful: she has never left the shores of Japan.

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