Standard trick - add a new variable (start) such that
for each n < start n is known to be busy. Allocation can
skip checking everything in [0..start) and if it returns
n, we can set start to n + 1. Freeing below start sets
start to what we'd just freed.
Of course, it still sucks if we do something like
free 0
allocate
allocate
in a loop - still O(n^2) time. However, on saner loads it
improves the things a lot and the entire thing is not worth
the trouble of switching to something with better worst-case
behaviour.