DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband and I went out to brunch to celebrate three single friends’ birthdays. The three of them had made these plans among themselves and then invited us after the planning, when matters of date, time and place were already set.

When the check came, my husband went to pick it up. One of the birthday celebrants said, “No, we’re all paying.” After a little back-and-forth, everybody paid an equal portion of the bill.

Yet one of the birthday celebrants was miffed, as he let us all know later, over another meal together. He said that he didn’t like having to pay for his own birthday brunch. (We are old people with even older friends, so the truth usually comes out.)

I explained that he didn’t buy his own birthday brunch: He bought brunch for Celebrant No. 1, who bought brunch for Celebrant No. 2, who bought brunch for him — and that my husband and I paid our own way just so we could be with all of them.

Somehow this made him even more miffed, so we all dropped the subject. How should we have handled this?

GENTLE READER: Another way to think of it is that your presence in no way affected the split: In your absence, the three single friends would each have contributed one-third of the total.

But, as you must have known when you made your explanation, math was never going to improve your friend’s mood. Miss Manners, who is unimpressed that this friend’s honesty won out over his civility or feelings of friendship, would have had you say, “I’m sorry you were disappointed.”

Please send your questions to Miss Manners at missmanners.com, by email to [email protected], or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.