Can anybody explain this:

I am using lcc (Windows XP) to make a simple dialog box. Why do the following lines in my .rc file produce different results:

PUSHBUTTON "?", 124, HX, (MINY-2)+2*YSTEP, HXL, HYL
PUSHBUTTON "?", 124, HX, MINY-2+2*YSTEP, HXL, HYL

Only the first line puts the button at the desired position. In case you need to know, MINY and YSTEP are defined as:

#define MINY 7
#define YSTEP 14

Is this a bug in lcc or is there something I don't know about the laws of mathematics in .rc files?

it would help if you told us what y positions the two push button actually have (I'm sure you can check with some code). From that, you should be able to establish what is being done differently.