Free QB VII by Leon Uris Page B

surprise the boy was skipping ahead in his classes. Although he fared well in Australia, Fort Bobang was his home, where he could take those wonderful trips on the Lemanak with his father.
    And then Adam received news that distressed him more than he believed possible. MacAlister was retiring and moving to England. There had never been either intimacy or affection between the men, and he wondered why it bothered him so.
    The Kelnos went to Kuching, where a farewell dinner was given for MacAlister and Sir Edgar Bates, the governor, who was departing for England to attend the coronation of the new queen. Sir Edgar would also remain in England and a new governor would be assigned to Sarawak.
    Even in places so remote, the British knew how to conduct their affairs with flourish and fanfare. The ballroom was white with colonial uniforms and colored with sashes and medals.
    There were a multitude of toasts filled with true and mock sentiment. Things were changing quickly these days. The sun was setting on that Empire where the sun was never supposed to set. In Asia, and Africa, and America it fell like a house of dominoes. The Malayans in Sarawak had picked up the cadence of the freedom wind.
    As the evening reached its zenith, Adam turned to his wife and took her hand. “I have a surprise for you,” he said. “We leave in the morning for Singapore, and we will fly to Australia to visit Stephan and perhaps a short vacation in New Zealand.”
    The long night of Adam Kelno was coming to an end.

14
    T HE NEW GOVERNOR WAS a persuasive fellow and convinced Adam to take the appointment as chief medical officer of the Second Division. With freedom in the air there was an urgent attempt to leap forward. The training of civil servants and upgrading the medical and educational facility took priority. Development of forests and mines by Sarawak-Orient ran parallel to an infusion of new teachers, nurses, airfields, and ports.
    In the Second Division Adam was able to remain in Fort Bobang but inherited over a hundred thousand persons, mostly Ibans with a smattering of Chinese and Malayans in the population centers. Adam had four doctors and a dozen nurses and assistants and of course Terrence Campbell, with primitive aide stations at the long houses. They were badly understaffed to cope with the range of diseases and problems, but he still had a higher ratio than the other Division Medical officers, who could only claim one doctor to every thirty-five thousand people.
    His long suit remained the utilization of the land. There simply was not enough grazing land or farm land, so the threat of famine always lurked. Even as taboos were being broken he was unable to penetrate the ones forbidding the eating of deer and goats. It was the Iban belief that these animals were reincarnations of dead ancestors. Conversely he was unable to stop them from eating rats.
    In searching United Nations bulletins and other works on the subject, Kelno became entranced by similar work in the new state of Israel. Although they were entirely different in make-up, Israel and Sarawak shared the fate of land shortage and acute deficiencies of beef and protein.
    Israel had filled the protein gap with crops requiring very little land. Intense chicken hatcheries worked on a twenty-four hour basis. This idea was not suitable for the Ibans. The buildings required electricity to light them so the hens would lay around the clock. Also, the chicken itself was a disease prone fowl requiring a more advanced mentality to raise properly.
    It was the second idea that caught Kelno’s fancy, the artificial fish ponds. Israel had a consulate in Burma, her first diplomatic exchange in the Far East, and a number of Israeli agricultural experts were sent to establish experimental farms. He was sorely tempted to go to Burma and study the fish farms, but his fear of being recognized by a Jew overruled it.
    He gathered the available literature and near Fort Bobang had his students build a